Preamble

The House met at Half-past Two o'Clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — POSTAL SERVICE, NEWBURY—LONDON

Mr. Hurd: asked the Postmaster-General if he will ensure that letters sent by the afternoon collection in the Newbury rural area reach addresses in central London by the first delivery on the following morning.

The Assistant Postmaster-General (Mr. Hobson): Letters for London posted in time for the afternoon collections in the Newbury rural area are due to be delivered by first post next week-day. If the hon. Member will let me have particulars and, if possible, the envelopes of any letters which appear to have been delayed, I shall be glad to have full inquiry made.

Mr. Hurd: Will the Minister keep a particular watch upon this matter, as I have had a good number of complaints from constituents? I will gladly do what he suggests.

Mr. Hobson: Certainly.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL AIR FORCE

Ex-Service Personnel (Private Addresses)

Mr. J. Langford-Holt: asked the Secretary of State for Air whether he will give instructions that wives shall be informed of the whereabouts of their ex-Service husbands when this is known in order that proceedings for maintenance or divorce may be instituted.

The Under-Secretary of State for Air (Mr. Geoffrey de Freitas): No, Sir, but the last recorded private address is disclosed to solicitors or officers of the court when it is required in connection with divorce or maintenance proceedings.

Mr. Langford-Holt: Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the situation which arose in a case which I drew to his notice recently where a warrant officer who has deserted his wife and is receiving a pension from the Air Ministry, cannot be reached by his wife owing to the attitude of the hon. Gentleman's Ministry?

Mr. de Freitas: We will always forward any letters to the addresses that we have for ex-airmen or ex-officers. It would be quite wrong to disclose to anybody facts which come to our knowledge through their service.

Bombing Range, Perranporth

Commander Agnew: asked the Secretary of State for Air if he will reconsider the proposal to use the beach at Perranporth and Penhale Sands as a bombing and gunnery range in view of the representations which have been made as to the crippling effect upon the holiday resorts of Newquay and Perranporth.

Mr. de Freitas: My right hon. Friend is in consultation with other Ministers about this proposal. Full attention is being paid to these representations.

Building, South Ruislip

Mr. Piratin: asked the Secretary of State for Air to what use does he intend putting the building of 110,000 square feet in Victoria Road, South Ruislip; and what is the cost.

Mr. de Freitas: It will be used by the United States Air Force instead of the accomodation they now occupy in Bushy Park. The rent is being negotiated and it will be paid by the United States Air Force.

Mr. Piratin: Can the Minister say what specific use will be made of the building; will it be used to house United States airmen? If that is the case, may I suggest that there are plenty of British citizens in Ruislip who are in need of rehousing.

Mr. de Freitas: So far as I know, the building will not be used to house or to rehouse airmen but to replace office accommodation in Bushy Park.

61 Maintenance Unit (Thefts)

Mr. William Shepherd: asked the Secretary of State for Air the recorded loss through pilferage since the end of the


war at No. 61 Maintenance Unit; and, in view of the recent criticism at the Chester Quarter Sessions, what special steps he is taking to improve security.

Mr. de Freitas: The loss is £3,760. The unit is guarded by Air Ministry constabulary and Service police with police dogs. All locks at the unit have been changed and in future they will be changed at frequent but irregular intervals.

Mr. Shepherd: Is not the Minister aware that the area concerned there is enormous and that obviously, as it is at present arranged, security is impossible? Does he intend to reduce the area, which he would agree is somewhat scattered?

Mr. de Freitas: I agree that it is a large area. I regret that there has been any pilfering at all, but I do not think the security is bad because £3,700 out of about £40 million worth of stores and equipment is not such a great loss.

Mr. Shepherd: Is the Minister aware that an officer giving evidence at Chester Quarter Sessions said he did not know what was there for the last 12 months and therefore did not know what the pilfering had been?

Mr. de Freitas: I am not surprised at that at all. The officer at the quarter sessions was an adjutant who went to give evidence of the character of three airmen. He was not in a position to know the value of the stores in question.

Mr. Drayson: If there is £40 million worth of equipment which is inadequately protected, would the Minister take every precaution against sabotage of this Government property?

Mr. de Freitas: I am sorry if I misled the House. The figure of approximately £40 million is the rough total value of the stores there now and the stores handled since the war, which is the period covered by this Question. There would be about £20 million of stores there now, and on the whole I consider that the protection is good.

Oral Answers to Questions — AIRCRAFT ACCIDENT, SHOREHAM

Mr. William Teeling: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of

Civil Aviation whether his attention has been called to the inquest on two private aeroplane flyers killed while flying the Brookside Flying Group's only aeroplane from Shoreham aerodrome last February; and whether he proposes to hold a public inquiry.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation (Mr. Lindgren): Yes, Sir. The answer to the second part of the Question is "No, Sir."

Mr. Teeling: Does the Minister realise that this aircraft might easily have come down over Brighton instead of into the sea, and that the matter is causing a lot of local concern because of the fact that the group now have another aircraft? Can no supervision be provided? Furthermore, is it not always the custom where there is an air accident that some inquiry is made and afterwards the results of the inquiry are made public?

Mr. Lindgren: Yes, Sir. If I may work backwards I would tell the House that there was an inquiry carried out by the Chief Inspector of Accidents. The report can be had by anyone who is interested in it. I am not quite certain whether it was published in the same way as other reports are published. So far as regulations are concerned, flying is difficult enough at the present time. We do not want to make it more difficult and to regulate it completely out of the sky.

Mr. Teeling: Does the Minister feel that there should be further supervision? There are quite enough rules and regulations already, but there ought to be provision for the safety of the public.

Mr. Lindgren: The regulations are made under the Air Navigation Order, 1949, which came into force on 1st April this year. Responsibility is jointly on the operator of the aircraft and on the person in command of it. There is a regulation for the certificate of airworthiness, while the person who flies it must have a pilot's licence.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRANSJORDAN (BRITISH TROOPS)

Dr. Segal: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs how long it is proposed that British troops should remain at Aqaba.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Mayhew): At the request of the Transjordan Government the British Force at Aqaba is being left there at its present strength for the present. It will remain there as long as the situation requires it.

Dr. Segal: Since the State of Israel has already established itself on the Gulf of Aqaba and proposes to build a proper modern port there, can my hon. Friend explain how we are helping the State of Transjordan or the interests of this country by keeping British troops in this muddy little village?

Mr. Mayhew: I think their presence there has been helpful and I do not think that the present situation calls for any change.

Mr. Warbey: Will the hon. Gentleman make a contribution towards a general peace settlement in the Middle East by withdrawing the British troops in accordance with the terms of the recent Israeli-Transjordan armistice?

Mr. Mayhew: I cannot agree that their withdrawal would be such a contribution at the present time.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMANY

War Plants (Dismantling)

Mr. Platts-Mills: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what agreement has been reached on the German war plants scheduled for dismantling.

Mr. Mayhew: I assume the hon. Member is referring to the result of the discussions on the Humphrey Committee's report, about which an announcement was made on 31st March. The dismantling of war plants was not under discussion and no new agreement was reached on this subject.

Mr. Platts-Mills: Does my hon. Friend remember that his right hon. Friend at Potsdam, and on a number of occasions in this House, gave the most solemn assurances that the countries which were ravaged by the Nazis would be assisted in their restoration and reconstruction by reparations from German capital equipment, and can my hon. Friend tell the House whether the change

in attitude which is now shown by keeping this heavy capital equipment in Western Germany is due to pressure from Wall Street or the Conservative Central Office or from both?

Mr. Mayhew: I think the hon. Gentleman is confused. The recent agreement does not refer to war plants at all.

Milk Supply (Children)

Mr. Lipson: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if it is now possible for children in the British zone of Berlin to be given fresh liquid milk instead of the dried hitherto supplied.

Mr. Mayhew: The three Western sectors of Berlin are fed as one unit. Children up to one year of age in all three sectors receive fresh milk which is produced locally. Considerations of space in the airlift and of hygiene have prevented the supply of fresh milk to older children.

Mr. Lipson: Have the Russians been asked whether they would be willing to relax the blockade for the provision of fresh milk for children, and if they have refused, can we do what the Americans are doing and bring fresh milk every day from Sweden in the interests of the health of the children?

Mr. Mayhew: I cannot recall if a formal request has been made to the Soviet Government, but the need for this has been made plain by us before.

Mr. Lipson: May a formal request be made?

Mr. H. Hynd: In regard to considerations of air lift space, would it not be just as economical to take the same bulk of fresh milk powder rather than the skimmed milk powder?

Mr. Mayhew: I should like to look into that point.

Mr. Piratin: In so far as fresh milk is obtained from the Russian zone, is it not the case that Berliners in Western Berlin can obtain fresh milk without hindrance in the Eastern sector of Berlin?

Mr. Mayhew: I know that we are prevented by the blockade from obtaining sufficient milk for children in the Western zone of Berlin.

Mr. Lipson: Will the hon. Gentleman consult his right hon. Friend and see if representations can now be made to the Russians to relax the blockade to allow the entry of fresh milk for children only?

Oral Answers to Questions — ERITREA (BRIGANDAGE)

Major Legge-Bourke: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will make a statement concerning the interruption by local inhabitants of a senior military officer's journey in the Massawa district of Eritrea during the latter part of March, 1949.

Mr. Mayhew: Brigadier H. E. Creedon, the Commander Eritrea district, was travelling from Asmara to Massawa on the 23rd March when his car was held up by three brigands armed with rifles and hand grenades. Brigadier Creedon, who was robbed but uninjured, was travelling without escort and was not in uniform. These brigands, locally known as Shifta, are professional robbers, but Brigadier Creedon's assailants have not yet been identified.

Major Legge-Bourke: Will the hon. Gentleman say whether these Shiftas have been making a habit of raiding and marauding, and, if so, what action is being taken to prevent this continuing?

Mr. Mayhew: I understand that this problem is not a new one in this rather remote district. I should like notice of the question about suppression.

General Sir George Jeffreys: Will the hon. Gentleman say whether adequate police arrangements have been made in Eritrea for dealing with cases of this kind and others?

Mr. Mayhew: We are doing what we can, but I do not think I can undertake that this will be suppressed altogether with the resources which we have available.

Major Legge-Bourke: Is it known where the arms which these people had came from?

Mr. Mayhew: I should need notice of that question.

Oral Answers to Questions — COLONIAL EMPIRE (IMPORTED GOODS)

Mr. Dodds-Parker: asked the Secre-of State for the Colonies to what extent manufactured goods from Russian-controlled countries are being dumped in the British colonial territories.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies (Mr. Rees-Williams): My right hon. Friend is not aware that any such goods are being dumped in the Colonies.

Mr. Dodds-Parker: Will the Under-Secretary make further inquiries and see to what extent Bata shoes from Czechoslovakia are being dumped in West Africa below the cost of production?

Mr. Rees-Williams: I will look into that matter.

Oral Answers to Questions — TANGANYIKA

Corporal Punishment

Mr. Skinnard: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies for what offences corporal punishment may be inflicted in Tanganyika.

Mr. Rees-Williams: As the reply is necessarily somewhat long I will, with my hon. Friend's permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Skinnard: Can the Minister tell the House whether the reply is long because of the number of offences or for other reasons?

Mr. Rees-Williams: It is long because I am giving my hon. Friend the information for which he asked.

Following is the reply:

Corporal punishment in Tanganyika is inflicted under the Penal Code for certain offences against morality, persons, animals and property. Offences against the persons include robbery with violence and aggravated assaults. Offences against property include burglary, house-breaking and similar offences where previous conviction exists in a similar offence. In addition corporal punishment is authorised for juveniles convicted of offences punishable under the Penal Code and other laws.

Prisons legislation permits corporal punishment of convicted criminal prisoners for

(a) Mutiny
(b) Incitement to mutiny
(c) Personal violence to Prison Officers.

Native courts may only inflict corporal punishment on adults for

(a) Indecent assaults
(b) Assaults aggravated by the age, sex or condition of the victim or particular savagery on the part of the offender.
(c) Stock theft.

and on juveniles convicted of offences punishable under any Laws which Native courts are empowered to enforce. All sentences of corporal punishment imposed by Native Courts whether on adults or juveniles are subject to confirmation by an administrative officer.

Ex-German Estates (Allocation)

Mr. Skinnard: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what area of the ex-German estates in Tanganyika has been allocated to Europeans; and how much of this land is still unallocated.

Mr. Rees-Williams: Eighty-seven thousand seven hundred and ninety acres have been allocated to Europeans and 264,230 acres remain unallocated.

Oral Answers to Questions — MALAYA

Police Action (Shooting)

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will now give details of the shooting of two Chinese women by the police in Malaya on 23rd February.

Mr. Rees-Williams: I have already written to my hon. Friend, giving him all the available details of this incident.

Mr. Hughes: Is the Minister aware that in his reply to me he says that he admits that two women were shot down and that they were shot down after a half-mile chase? What kind of police were they that could not catch a woman in less than half-a-mile? Will the hon. Gentleman give instructions that unarmed women are not to be followed and shot by police in future?

Mr. Gallacher: On a point of Order, Mr. Speaker. Before trying to catch your eye to ask a question of the Minister

with regard to this affair and in view of a former Ruling of yours, I would like to ask you whether it would be in Order for me to refer to the shooting of these two women as a shocking case of foul and bloody murder? Would that be in order?

Mr. Speaker: I should have thought not.

Mr. Gallacher: I want to ask the Minister if in view of the statement that has been made by his own Department on the deliberate shooting of these two women, one of whom was killed and the other seriously injured, he will condemn this action in a statement to the authorities there and condemn it as an act of murder? Will he also bring the police to trial?

Hon. Members: Answer.

Mr. Godfrey Nicholson: Surely the Under-Secretary is not going to sit there quietly and let such an accusation be levelled without comment against an Administration for which his Department is responsible?

Mr. Rees-Williams: These women were chased for half-a-mile, as has been stated. The police called upon them to halt and they refused to halt—

Mr. Platts-Mills: And they were murdered.

Mr. Rees-Williams: In the very enclosed situation that we have in Malaya, they were getting away. The police then fired—[HON. MEMBERS: "Shame."]—and as a result one woman was killed and the other died later in hospital.

Hon. Members: Murder.

Mr. Benn Levy: As what we have received is a bare record of facts which to many of us are rather shocking on the face of it, can my hon. Friend say whether he condemns this happening or whether there are any other facts which would enable him to justify it?

Mr. Rees-Williams: I always regret the death of any person, whether it is a policeman or a member of the public, but hon. Members must realise the intensely difficult situation in Malaya with which the police have to grapple. In these circumstances, the women dashed out of a house which was being searched and refused to stop, and in accordance


with the police promulgation previously made, they were liable to be fired on, and were in fact fired on.

Mr. Platts-Mills: Does the hon. Gentleman deny the half-mile chase that preceded the shooting?

Mr. Rees-Williams: No, Sir. I have said so.

British Government Policy

Mr. Skinnard: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the representations received by His Majesty's Government from the Government of Malaya, he will give an assurance that His Majesty's Government have no intention of relinquishing their responsibilities there.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): Yes, Sir. His Majesty's Government have no intention of relinquishing their responsibilities in Malaya until their task is completed. The purpose of our policy is simple. We are working, in co-operation with the citizens of the Federation of Malaya and Singapore, to guide them to responsible self-government within the Commonwealth. We have no intention of jeopardising the security, well-being and liberty of these peoples, for whom Britain has responsibilities, by a premature withdrawal.

Mr. Skinnard: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the satisfaction that will be felt, not only by the whole House, but in Malaya and in this country, at the nature of his answer?

Mr. Gallacher: Shooting down women—is that his responsibility?

Oral Answers to Questions — CYPRUS (SUPPRESSED NEWSPAPER)

Mr. Gallacher: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what report he has had from Cyprus regarding the suppression of the newspaper "Demokratis," and the imprisonment of the editor; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Rees-Williams: Charges against this paper arose out of an article in it alleging that the Cyprus Government was attempting through its local officials and in collusion with a local Right Wing

party, to falsify the municipal electoral rolls. The newspaper was suspended for three months and the managing director sentenced to imprisonment for the same period.

Mr. Gallacher: I would like to ask the Minister how he justifies this action on the part of the authorities in the suppression of this paper for three months and in the imprisonment of the editor? Will he not take steps to put a stop to this sort of thing and provide ordinary opportunities for political expression on the part of the Press?

Mr. Rees-Williams: It is not for me to comment upon the action of a court of law. This man and the newspaper have an appeal open to them if they so desire. I may point out that the managing director had four previous convictions, the last of which was for contempt of court.

Major Tufton Beamish: Will the Minister at least give an assurance that he will give the same freedom to this paper "Demokratis" as is given to the Opposition Press in Russia?

Oral Answers to Questions — WEST AFRICA

X-ray Apparatus

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the supply of X-ray apparatus for all the hospitals of West African Colonies has been or will be included in welfare and development plans; and how many hospitals now possess this apparatus.

Mr. Rees-Williams: The Governors concerned have been asked to supply the information required and I shall communicate with my hon. Friend when this is received.

Mr. Sorensen: Meanwhile, would the hon. Gentleman please take such steps as are possible to see that X-ray apparatus is supplied to all the hospitals in West Africa?

Mr. Rees-Williams: A number of X-ray apparatuses have been sent out to West Africa in the last three years.

Colonel Dower: Will the hon. Gentleman, when making his inquiries, also go into the hospital position in the territories in East Africa?

Dr. Segal: Is my hon. Friend aware that until recently there was in the Gold Coast at least one hospital 350 miles away from the nearest X-ray apparatus? Can he explain what is the use of keeping a hospital open in these circumstances?

Mr. Rees-Williams: Six X-ray apparatuses have been sent to the Gold Coast in the last three years. I hope in time all will be covered.

Goldmining Industry

Mr. Teeling: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies when and how was the invitation made to the West African goldmining industry to give the Government a review of the economic situation of the industry, accompanied by any suggestions which they might have to make; and if the invitation was given orally or in writing.

Mr. Rees-Williams: The request was made orally by the Colonial Secretary of the Gold Coast at a meeting with representatives of the local Chamber of Mines in January.

Mr. Teeling: Why was not this invitation given officially and in writing to the London representatives of the industry? After all, they have invariably been consulted in the past by the Government in these matters, and in view of the fact that the London representatives are now getting out a scheme as a result of the discussion the other night in this House, will the hon. Gentleman make sure that that scheme, which will be ready by the end of this month, will be discussed immediately with the Colonial Office?

Mr. Rees-Williams: It is assumed, and it is the fact, that the local representatives are closely in touch with the head offices in London.

Mr. Teeling: But why on this occasion, for the first time, is it that the Colonial Office have not consulted the London representatives first? They have always done that before and so have the Treasury.

Mr. Rees-Williams: I take it that this is a new and not necessarily a bad innovation.

Oral Answers to Questions — NIGERIA

Oba Follulu of Lagos

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what annual amount from Government sources is paid to the Oba Follulu of Lagos and for what purpose; and to what extent the Nigerian Government are responsible for the repair and maintenance of the Oba's palace.

Mr. Rees-Williams: The Oba is paid £500 a year in recognition of his position as head of the House of Docemo. So far as my right hon. Friend is aware the Nigerian Government accept no responsibility for the upkeep of his house.

Mr. Sorensen: But will the hon. Gentleman see whether this building, which is in a bad state of repair, cannot be recognised as an ancient monument of Nigeria and be, therefore, the responsibility of the Nigerian Government?

Mr. Rees-Williams: The Nigerian Government lent this gentleman some money to renovate the house. He renovated it and repaid the money but, apart from that, we have no responsibility.

Groundnut Production

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what consultations have taken place with the Emirs of the Northern region of Nigeria and other authorities in respect of improvements in the production of groundnuts in that area; and to what extent more modern methods have been successfully introduced.

Mr. Rees-Williams: The Governor of Nigeria has been asked for information on this subject but has not yet replied. As soon as his reply is received a communication will be sent to my hon. Friend.

Mr. Sorensen: But meanwhile, would the hon. Gentleman say whether any kind of consultations have taken place at any time with the authorities in Northern Nigeria in regard to this matter?

Mr. Rees-Williams: Yes, I am sure they have. I had some myself, and I am sure the Governor has had some.

Captain Crookshank: Yes, but is not the question here not so much a matter


of improving the production of groundnuts but of moving the groundnuts which have been produced already?

Mr. Rees-Williams: That is another question.

Captain Crookshank: Yes, it is an important one.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL NAVY

Navy List (Publication)

Mr. Langford-Holt: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty what information will be given in the editions of the Navy List which are to be published for public use.

The Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty (Mr. John Dugdale): The edition of the Navy List which is to be placed on sale to the public will contain lists of officers of the Royal Navy and its Reserves, showing their seniority, and where they are serving, together with a list of His. Majesty's ships and the officers serving in them. Corresponding information on the Commonwealth Navies will also be given.

Mr. Langford-Holt: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether any information at present given in the Navy List is to be excluded from the general edition?

Mr. Dugdale: Yes; naturally, as I said last time, this will not contain quite as much information as has been contained in the restricted edition available for hon. Members.

North Atlantic Treaty

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty what degree of co-operation there is now to be between the navies of the countries signing the North Atlantic Treaty; and what effect he anticipates that the treaty will have on the naval expenditure of this country.

Mr. Dugdale: Co-operation between the Royal Navy and the navies of other signatory powers, which is already close and friendly, will, of course, be further stimulated. As regards the second part of the Question, I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer given him on 7th April by my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury.

Mr. Hughes: In view of the strength of the American Navy and the co-operation that my hon. Friend has mentioned are we not entitled to look forward to a decrease in naval expenditure?

Mr. Dugdale: That is an entirely hypothetical question.

Mr. J. P. L. Thomas: Is not the Parliamentary Secretary aware that the great majority in this country are fully in favour of this increasing co-operation, and surely it is a fact that this co-operation means that expenditure will be less than if we were operating alone?

Mr. Dugdale: It is quite impossible to say until the plan has been worked out.

Compassionate Leave (Application)

Mr. Mack: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty if he will make a further effort to secure compassionate leave for Leading Patrolman T. Ikin of 54, Silverdale Road, Newcastle-under Lyme, now stationed in Malta to visit his dying mother.

Mr. Dugdale: No, Sir. I am afraid the circumstances do not justify this rating being brought home specially.

Mr. Mack: Would it not be a more appropriate gesture for my hon. Friend to extend these regulations in this and similar cases, especially in peace-time, and does he not think that if his Department showed a little more compassion and imagination in matters of this kind it would encourage recruitment and discourage discontent in the Services?

Mr. Dugdale: We are looking into this question to see whether it is possible for the regulations to be modified in any way, but I cannot say definitely yet what the decision will be.

Mr. John Lewis: Is my hon. Friend telling the House that in a case where it is established to the satisfaction of his Department that a mother is dying, there are regulations which prohibit him from making arrangements for this man to be sent home immediately?

Mr. Dugdale: Yes, the usual regulations are that if the mother has another son or a daughter present in the country,


the rating will not be brought back if he is required for duty. If there is no other son or daughter present, he will be brought back in any circumstances.

Mr. Mack: But in view of the fact that my hon. Friend is prepared to look into this matter, and that the mother is dying at the moment and may not last out that time, will he not take steps to try to help in this case?

Hon. Members: Hear, hear.

Mr. Dugdale: No, I said I was looking into the general question. If this rating were given special treatment before the general review takes place, it would be unfair to other ratings who have not had it up till now.

Mr. Mack: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I will raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Ratings (Civilian Clothes)

Mr. Teeling: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty why, in the Navy, only petty officers and above are allowed to wear civilian clothes when off duty; and why the lower ranks cannot have the same privileges as the Army and the Air Force.

Mr. Dugdale: All ratings on short leave except those under training and all ratings on leave over 24 hours may wear plain clothes outside the naval establishment in which they are employed. It is mainly in the wearing of civilian clothes inside naval establishments or when passing in and out of such establishments that a distinction is made between petty officers and above on the one hand, and the lower ratings, on the other hand. One reason for this is that naval ratings are always liable to be sent at short notice to sea-going appointments or to ships such as the Reserve Fleet where there are no facilities for keeping civilian clothing. A second reason is that in the barracks there is a quickly changing population which in general is not known to the guards at the entrances and, unless restrictions were placed on the freedom of passage of liberty men or extra security precautions were introduced, there would be difficulties if naval ratings in plain clothes were leaving and entering the barracks at different times,

especially in the evening when the numbers are large.

Mr. Teeling: Does the hon. Gentleman realise the very strong feeling on this matter amongst ratings in the Navy, and why should they be in a different position from the equivalent ranks in the Army and the Air Force? This attitude is not helping recruitment, and does not the Parliamentary Secretary realise that his answer is an extremely feeble one?

Mr. Dugdale: I am not aware that there is any strong feeling. In any case, these regulations have existed for a considerable time under previous Governments, of which the hon. Member was a supporter.

Mr. Teeling: Does the hon. Gentleman realise that although these regulations may have lasted for a very long time, so also did those for the Army and the Air Force, but those have been changed?

Mr. Gallacher: Is it not the case that lower ratings find it very difficult to buy civilian clothes, and is not this a further reason for supplying them with the necessary clothing?

Commander Noble: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that when I have corresponded with him on this subject in the past he has said that the matter was still under consideration, and is the answer he has given now the final one, or is the matter still under consideration?

Mr. Dugdale: No, Sir. It is the final one. My noble Friend considered the matter earlier this year and has made his decision.

Oral Answers to Questions — ANALGESIA (RESEARCH)

Mr. Peter Thorneycroft: asked the Lord President of the Council what research is at present being carried on by the Medical Research Council on the subject of the administration of analgesia in childbirth; whether research is going on upon the use of trilene for this object; how many types of trilene apparatus are at present being investigated; in which hospitals tests are being carried out; and what are the approximate numbers of research workers and amounts of money involved.

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): The special committee on the subject has only just been set up, and its first task will be to survey the problem before deciding what new investigations are required. The question remitted to the committee is on the possibility of devising improved or new methods of analgesia, whether with trilene or some other substance, and any examination of types of apparatus already available will be incidental.

Oral Answers to Questions — B.B.C. INQUIRY (CHAIRMAN)

Lieut.-Commander Clark Hutchison: asked the Lord President of the Council why an independent person having no previous connection with the British Broadcasting Corporation was not appointed to act as chairman of the forthcoming committee of inquiry.

Mr. H. Morrison: Sir Cyril Radcliffe was chosen as being particularly well fitted for the chairmanship of this committee. Far from being a drawback, the knowledge of the British Broadcasting Corporation which he obtained as Director-General of the Ministry of Information and later as deputy-Chairman of the Corporation's General Advisory Council should be of great assistance to him in conducting the inquiry. Any suggestion that Sir Cyril is not independent of the Corporation is quite unfounded.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Does not the Lord President think that a completely neutral person would have brought greater confidence to the public?

Mr. Morrison: Any suggestion that Sir Cyril Radcliffe is not neutral is unfounded and unkind. He is a perfectly neutral person and I have the utmost confidence in his impartiality as chairman of this committee.

Mr. Marlowe: If the right hon. Gentleman believes in the impartiality of chairmen, why does that not apply to the London County Council?

Oral Answers to Questions — ARMED FORCES

North Atlantic Treaty

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Minister of Defence what release of manpower from the Services and of arma-

ments industries for productive work he anticipates as a result of the measures to be taken under Articles 3 and 9 of the North Atlantic Treaty.

The Minister of Defence (Mr. A. V. Alexander): It would be premature to attempt now to assess the effect of these Articles on the manpower requirements of the Services.

Mr. Hughes: Has not the Minister seen the circular from his right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer urging upon him the need for economy and reduced expenditure, and cannot we expect some release of manpower as a result?

Mr. Alexander: I have most certainly had that circular, but I still get requests from hon. Members to increase my expenditure in certain respects. If it were not for the signing of the Pact this country might well be faced with heavily increased expenditure. We cannot assess any economies until we have considered the matter further.

Mr. Gallacher: That is nonsense.

Officers (Transfer Allowance)

Mr. A. R. W. Low: asked the Minister of Defence whether he is aware that better allowances are payable to civil servants than to officers of the Fighting Forces on permanent change of station; and whether he will now introduce better allowances for officers of the Fighting Forces.

Mr. Alexander: The regulations governing the payment of expenses on transfer for Service officers have only recently been revised after full consideration by the Service Departments. The regulations are different from those for civil servants, since the general conditions of service for officers and civil servants are dissimilar.

Mr. Low: Is it not true that these allowances for civil servants are better than the allowances given to officers in the Fighting Forces, and, in view of the fact that officers in the Fighting Forces are more frequently called upon to change their station, should not the Minister have another look at this matter in the light of the facts, and particularly in the light of present-day costs of moving?

Mr. Alexander: This has all been taken into consideration in the previous review of the conditions attaching to the Services. The conditions for civil servants are, in fact, very different. They are not displaced so often. The general level of their rates of pay is lower compared with that of corresponding officer ranks, and all this has been taken into consideration. I have nothing to add, therefore, to my answer.

Major Legge-Bourke: Do the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman cover also the employees of British Overseas Airways, and, if not, will he look into that matter also, because it is certainly a case of discrepancy?

Mr. Alexander: I will certainly have a look at it, but I do not regard them as being in quite the same category.

Commander Noble: Does the Minister's answer mean that he has abandoned the idea of what I think he once referred to as a "disturbance allowance"?

Mr. Alexander: The general question of officers' expenses was taken into account when we fixed the increased marriage allowance.

Oral Answers to Questions — FOOD SUPPLIES

Potatoes (Resale)

Mr. Langford-Holt: asked the Minister of Food how many tons of home-grown potatoes have been bought by his Department and resold to the producer at a cheaper price.

The Minister of Food (Mr. Strachey): Up to 26th March, 78,952 tons of potatoes bought from growers under the guarantee had been sold back to them at the cheaper stockfeed price.

Mr. Langford-Holt: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what was the financial outcome of this transaction?

Mr. Strachey: We can hardly separate that from the general sale of surplus potatoes for stockfeed, of which I have already given the House the figures.

Mr. Dye: Can my right hon. Friend say whether it is part of the guarantee given to the growers that the Ministry will purchase all their potatoes and leave none on their hands?

Mr. Strachey: Yes. Of course, it would be the most outrageous breach of the guarantee if we did not fulfil it by purchasing these potatoes.

Mr. Collins: Can my right hon. Friend say whether the tonnage is less than 1 per cent. of the total crop?

Mr. Strachey: If my arithmetic serves me aright, that is the case.

Investigation Methods

Mr. Grey: asked the Minister of Food if he is now prepared to make a statement about the investigations carried out by his Department into black market operations in the Northern Region and on the kind of methods used in "operation Octopus" of which he did not approve.

Mr. Strachey: I would prefer to make this statement after the Easter Recess as I shall then be in a position to announce the measures which I am taking to prevent the recurrence of the methods of investigation of which I could not approve. I hope my hon. Friend will agree that this will be more satisfactory than making one statement now and then a further statement later.

Allocations (Co-operative Societies)

Mr. Turton: asked the Minister of Food to what extent a bigger share of pointed and rationed goods are allocated to the Co-operative Wholesale Society's factories and co-operative retail shops.

Mr. Strachey: Rationed foods, dried fruit and imported canned foods directly controlled by my Department are allocated to co-operative and private traders on precisely the same basis. When last Autumn we were able to give some extra sugar to all manufacturers we departed from the previous method of distribution according to pre-war usage because this basis had become more and more unfair with each year that went by, since it made no allowance for the transfer of customers from one type of shop to another. For example, the number of customers dealing with Co-operative Societies had grown very markedly since the datum year of 1938. If we had reallotted the sugar in proportion to present registrations, as there is a strong case for doing, the Co-operatives would


have got far more. The adjustment which we made still left the Co-operative Societies at a distinct disadvantage as compared with private traders.

Mr. Turton: In view of that reply, may I ask if the Minister's attention has been drawn to the advertisement inserted in the popular Press by the Co-operative Wholesale Society in these terms:
Register all your ration books at the Co-op—you'll get a bigger share of scarcer goods that way!
[Interruption.]—and in view of the Minister's previous statement on policy will he stop this cruel deception for attracting the consuming public?

Mr. Strachey: No, Sir. I see no element of deception in the Co-operative Society's advertisements. They claim to distribute their products more equitably between customers. It is not for me either to endorse or to comment upon that claim.

Mr. James Hudson: As there was a total increase of the membership of Co-operative Societies and the Minister admits that there was a case for an even further increase of sugar, which is not denied by anyone on the benches opposite, will the Minister take into account the necessity for that further increase?

Mr. Strachey: Certainly my only doubt in the steps we took at that time was whether they were adequate or not.

Captain Crookshank: Is it not a fact that private retailers have also increased the number of their customers in view of the great increase of the whole population?

Mr. Strachey: Yes, Sir, but not in proportion.

Mr. Mikardo: Is not the greater opportunity for getting a larger share in a Co-operative shop due to the fact that all the goods in those shops are above the counter?

Imports from Yugoslavia

Mr. Mott-Radclyffe: asked the Minister of Food what items of foodstuffs specified in Schedule I of the Anglo-Yugoslav Trade Agreement have so far been purchased by his Department; and when delivery of these is expected.

Mr. Strachey: My Department has so far bought 560 tons of canned fish and 750 tons of white beans. The canned fish has already arrived in this country and the beans are due for shipment this month. We have also bought 75,000 tons of maize, but this is outside Schedule A.

Fried Fish Licence (Application)

Mr. Turton: asked the Minister of Food, why he has refused to grant an allocation of fats to an applicant for permission to open a fried-fish shop in Appleton-le-Moors; whether he is aware that this village and the surrounding area are seriously penalised by the absence of fish-frying facilities; and whether he will review his decision.

Mr. Strachey: Unfortunately, this application was received too late for the open season for new fried-fish licences which lasted from 1st October to 1st November. Therefore it had to be considered on strict grounds of consumer needs and the local food committee could not agree to it. After looking into the circumstances, I really cannot see good grounds for overruling their decision.

Mr. Turton: Is the Minister aware that in this area one has to walk more than six miles to get any fried fish? Will he look into the matter again?

Mr. Strachey: No, Sir, my information is that Appleton-le-Moors is already served by a mobile fish and chips van, which visits it once a week.

Imported Fruit (Allocations)

Mr. Collins: asked the Minister of Food if he is aware that retailers allocations of imported fruits under the control of his Department were last reviewed in October, 1947, and if he will arrange for an early re-assessment.

Mr. Strachey: I am taking measures necessary for such a review at once.

Overseas Food Corporation (Projects)

Commander Noble: asked the Minister of Food if he will make a statement on the projects now in hand, or under consideration, by the British Food Corporation.

Mr. Strachey: The Overseas Food Corporation, to which I take it the hon. Member refers, has in hand the East African Scheme for producing oilseeds and, in association with the Queensland Government, the Queensland Scheme for the production of sorghum and pigs. If the hon. Member wishes for information about projects under consideration, he should communicate with the Corporation direct.

Herring (Landings, Lerwick)

Sir David Robertson: asked the Minister of Food what arrangements he has made to ensure that herring landed at Lerwick during the forthcoming season will be distributed throughout Great Britain in preference to sending them to Germany.

Mr. Strachey: Landings of herring during the Summer at the mainland ports are more than enough to meet the needs of the home market, and it would be uneconomic to use Lerwick herring for that purpose. I shall do all I can to encourage consumption of herring at home, but for the disposal of a part of the catch, especially the Lerwick catch, we must continue to rely on our traditional export market.

Sir D. Robertson: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that there will be a much bigger demand for herring this year because of the great shortage of meat? Will he consider adopting a similar plan to that used by the original Ministry of Food when they put on a small cargo vessel service between Stornoway, Kyle, Oban and Mallaig?

Mr. Strachey: We will certainly consider that, if the home market shows signs of being able to absorb such quantities.

Meat Ration (Butchers' Rebate)

The following Question stood upon the Order Paper in the name of Mr. DAVID RENTON:
43. To ask the Minister of Food whether he is aware that, now that the total meat ration has been reduced to 10d. per person per week, butchers serving rural areas are unable to distribute the ration without financial loss in spite of the rebate of 4½ per cent. of the wholesale price; and whether he will increase that rebate and, if necessary, make differential rates of rebate as between butchers serving urban and rural areas.

Mr. Renton: Since I put down this Question the rebate has been reduced, I understand, to 3¾ per cent.

Mr. Strachey: I am advised that the rebate on the wholesale price of meat has been calculated to give an adequate profit to the retail butchery trade. I cannot agree that the costs of rural butchers are on balance higher than those of butchers serving urban areas.

Mr. Renton: Is the Minister quite ignorant of the fact that rural butchers endeavour to supply meat to their customers by means of a delivery service? Has that delivery service been borne in mind when fixing these so-called profit margins, or was there merely an average struck between town and country? Will he look into the matter further?

Mr. Strachey: I should not have thought that the delivery services were confined to rural butchers, nor that that was the only element in costs and that such costs as rent, would be smaller in the rural areas.

Eire Cattle (Prices)

General Sir George Jeffreys: asked the Minister of Food whether he is aware that it is impossible for private enterprise buyers to obtain the 90 per cent. of Eire cattle to which this country is entitled in our agreement with Eire unless they are put in a position to pay prices which are competitive with those offered by Continental buyers; and whether he will amend his regulations so as to enable them to do so.

Mr. Strachey: No, Sir. I am satisfied that the price agreement which has now been reached is such that the Eire Government will have no difficulty in ensuring that we get the 90 per cent. of their cattle exports, which they have agreed to send us from next July onwards. In fact, the import of fat and store cattle from Eire into Great Britain during the last three months for which figures are available, namely, January, February and March, were 75,217 as compared to 61,698 in the corresponding months a year ago, an increase of 22 per cent.

Sir G. Jeffreys: Is not the controlled price in this country 113s. a cwt. and has not the private buyer to calculate at what price he must buy in order to be able to sell at a small profit in this country after


paying expenses? In view of the fact that there is not a controlled price for meat on the Continent, is it not too easy for Continental buyers to outbid the price which our buyers can afford to bid?

Mr. Strachey: That is why we made the recent agreement with the Eire Government. For this year their exports to other countries were restricted to 50,000 and for the future to 10 per cent. of their total exports. The Eire Government are adhering to this agreement most scrupulously.

Sir. G. Jeffreys: But do the Eire Government assist British private buyers in this matter? Are they not very much handicapped by the present arrangement?

Mr. Strachey: No, Sir. In this case I should be loath to take the matter out of private hands. I get a great deal of pressure from hon. Members opposite, but I think that would be carrying the principle of bulk buying too far.

Oral Answers to Questions — RAILWAY LAND (ALLOTMENTS)

Mr. Peter Freeman: asked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he is taking to arrange for the utilisation of the verges of railways for the production of food, especially for fruit and allotments for vegetables.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture (Mr. George Brown): At 1st April, 1948, there were 75,306 allotments on 4,321 acres of railway land. The railways have willingly co-operated with local authorities in the provision of additional allotments, subject of course to fencing the land from the railway where necessary in the interests of safety, and to reservation of the right to re-enter the land at short notice for railway purposes.

Mr. Freeman: In view of this large and extensive area of land now under the control of the Government, will my hon. Friend consult the Ministry of Transport as to what further use could be made of the land for the production of food, particularly for allotments?

Mr. Brown: We do not think there is need for that, but if a local authority

thinks there is land which can be made available they should get into touch with the estate manager and rating agent of the railway region concerned.

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Will the hon. Gentleman take into account the immense amounts of forage grass that goes to waste every year in this respect?

Mr. Chetwynd: Would it not be a bad thing to grow fruit trees by the side of railways, as that might prove a danger by attracting boys to the trees and so on to the railway lines?

Oral Answers to Questions — STRIKE, LONDON DOCKS

Mr. Eden: (by Private Notice) asked the Minister of Labour whether he has any further statement to make on the London Docks strike.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Isaacs): Yes, Sir. The information this morning showed the total number of stevedores and dockers on strike as 15,030. The majority of the lightermen have accepted work in loyal observance of the decision which was taken last night but an unknown number absented themselves. At a meeting of the Transport and General Workers' Union this morning, a general decision was reached to resume work tomorrow at the normal starting time. Following agreement with the port employers, the Transport and General Workers' Union have also instructed their docks officers to assist in the building up of the gangs that are at present broken. The continuity rule will then apply to the newly constituted gangs of men available in the port for work. I should like to express my appreciation of the public spirited action of the union in these matters.

Mr. Eden: I take it from the much better complexion of the news which the right hon. Gentleman has given us, and which we all welcome, that there still remains the position of the stevedores' union. Can the Minister assure us that meanwhile, in view of this development, he is satisfied about the position of perishable foodstuffs?

Mr. Isaacs: The resumption of work by the workers of the Transport and General Workers' Union makes the situation much easier. We shall still be losing the services of the stevedores but the


Government have every intention of taking every step open to them to ensure the proper flow of the necessary food supplies and other things.

Mr. Gallacher: May I ask the Minister, as a trade unionist, whether this is not a somewhat mean and contemptible method of strike breaking?

Mr. Isaacs: The hon. Member asks me that question "as a trade unionist." I would say that if one examines the motives in this matter one will find a good example of a mean and contemptible attempt to take advantage of other people.

Oral Answers to Questions — COMMONWEALTH PRIME MINISTERS (RECEPTION)

Mr. Godfrey Nicholson: (by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister whether he has been able to make arrangements for Members of Parliament to meet the Commonwealth Prime Ministers in an informal manner during the period of the forthcoming Conference.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): Yes, Sir. I am glad to be able to announce to the House that you, Mr. Speaker, have been kind enough to agree to act as host with the Lord Chancellor at a reception in your house from 5.0 p.m. to 7.0 p.m. on Tuesday, 26th April, to which all Members of both Houses of Parliament are invited and at which I very much hope that all the Prime Ministers and their principal Ministerial advisers attending the Conference will be present. Individual invitations will not be issued, but you, Sir, have asked me to say that you hope that as many hon. Members as possible will accept this general invitation.

Mr. Nicholson: I hope that I shall not be thought to be presuming if, on behalf of all parties, I venture to thank you, Mr. Speaker, for your impending hospitality; and I should like to thank the Prime Minister for acceding to the suggestion made to him.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Eden: Will the Lord President of the Council tell us what the Business is to be for the first week after the Easter Recess?

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): Yes, Sir. The Business for the first week after the Easter Recess will be as follows:
Tuesday, 26th April—Supply (11th Allotted Day). It is proposed to move Mr. Speaker out of the Chair on going into Committee of Supply on the Civil Estimates and Estimates for Revenue Departments, 1949-50. The hon. Member for Cardigan (Mr. Bowen) is calling attention to war pensions and allowances.
Wednesday and Thursday, 27th and 28th April—Iron and Steel Bill. First and 2nd allotted days, respectively, of the Report stage.
Friday, 29th April—Committee and remaining stages of the Commonwealth Telegraphs Bill;
Report and Third Reading of the War Damage (Public Utility Undertakings, &c.) Bill, and of the Milk (Special Designations) Bill [Lords].

Proceedings on Government Business exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[The Prime Minister.]

SITTINGS OF THE HOUSE

House to meet Tomorrow at Eleven o'Clock; no Questions to be taken after Twelve o'Clock; and at Five o'Clock Mr. Speaker to adjourn the House without putting any Question.—[The Prime Minister.]

ADJOURNMENT (EASTER)

House, at its rising Tomorrow, to adjourn till Tuesday, 26th April.—[The Prime Minister.]

Orders of the Day — WAYS AND MEANS

REPORT [6th April]

Resolutions reported.

[For particulars of Resolutions, see OFFICIAL REPORT, 6th April, 1949; c. 2109–2119.]

First Resolution agreed to.

Second Resolution [Beer (Excise)] read a Second time.

Question, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution," put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions).

The House divided: Ayes. 369; Noes, 13.

Division No. 100.]
AYES
[3.25 p.m.


Acland, Sir Richard
Cove, W. G.
Grierson, E.


Adams, Richard (Balham)
Crawley, A.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanelly)


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Cripps, Rt. Hon. Sir S.
Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)


Albu, A. H.
Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. F. C.
Grimston, R. V.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V.
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.
Guest, Dr. L. Haden


Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)
Crowder, Capt. John E
Gunter, R. J


Alpass, J. H.
Cullen, Mrs.
Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil


Amory, D. Heathcoat
Cuthbert, W. N.
Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R.


Anderson, A. (Motherwell)
Daggar, G.
Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)


Assheton, Rt. Hon. R.
Daines, P.
Hardy, E. A.


Astor, Hon. M.
Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.
Harrison, J.


Attewell, H. C.
Darling, Sir W. Y.
Harvey, Air-Comdre. A V


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Davidson, Viscountess
Haughton, S G


Austin, H. Lewis
Davies, Edward (Burslem)
Haworth, J.


Awbery, S. S.
Davies, Haydn (St. Pancras, S.W.)
Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C


Ayles, W. H.
Deer, G.
Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Kingswinford)


Bacon, Miss A.
de Freitas, Geoffrey
Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)


Baird, J.
De la Bare, R.
Hewitson, Capt. M.


Baldwin, A. E.
Delargy, H. J.
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount


Balfour, A.
Diamond, J.
Hobson, C. R.


Barlow, Sir J.
Digby, Simon Wingfield
Hogg, Hon. Q.


Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J.
Dobbie, W.
Hollis, M. C.


Barstow, P. G.
Dodds, N. N
Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)


Barton, C.
Dodds-Parker, A. D.
Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)


Battley, J. R.
Donner, P. W
Horabin, T L.


Baxter, A B.
Donovan, T.
Houghton, A. L. N. D


Beamish, Maj. T. V. H.
Dower, Col. A. V. G (Penrith)
Hughes, H. D. (Wolverhampton, W.)


Bechervaise, A. E.
Drewe, C.
Hurd, A.


Benson, G.
Driberg, T. E. N.
Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)


Binns, J.
Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)
Hutchison, Lt.-Cm. Clark (E'b'rgh W.)


Birch, Nigel
Dugdale, Maj. Sir T. (Richmond)
Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)


Blackburn, A. R.
Dye, S.
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)


Boardman, H.
Eccles, D. M.
Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)


Bossom, A. C.
Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.


Bottomley, A. G.
Eden, Rt. Hon. A.
Jay, D. P. T.


Bower, N.
Edwards, Rt. Hon. Sir C. (Bedwellty)
Jeffreys, General Sir G.


Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Edwards, John (Blackburn)
Jager, G. (Winchester)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl. Exch'ge)
Edwards, Rt. Hon. N. (Caerphilly
Jager, Dr. S. W. (St. Pancras, S. E.)


Bramall, E. A.
Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)
Jenkins, R. H.


Brook, D. (Halifax)
Evans, Albert (Islington, W.)
Jennings, R.


Brooks, T. J (Rothwell)
Evans, John (Ogmore)
Johnston, Douglas


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)
Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)


Brown, George (Belper)
Ewart, R.
Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)


Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Farthing, W. J.
Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)


Brown, W. J. (Rugby)
Fernyhough, E.
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.


Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.
Field, Capt. W. J.
Keeling, E. H.


Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)
Keenan, W.


Bullock, Capt. M.
Follick, M.
Kenyon, C.


Burden, T. W.
Foot, M. M.
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.


Burke, W. A.
Forman, J. C.
Kinghorn, Sqn.-Ldr E.


Butcher, H. W.
Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)
Kinley, J.


Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)
Fraser, Sir I. (Lonsdale)
Kirkwood, Rt. Hon. D


Callaghan, James
Fraser, T (Hamilton)
Lancaster, Col. C G


Carson, E.
Freeman, J. (Watford)
Langford-Holt, J


Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Freeman, Peter (Newport)
Lavers, S.


Chamberlain, R. A.
Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.
Lawson, Rt. Hon. J. J


Chater, D.
Gaitskell Rt. Hon. H. T. N
Lee, F. (Hulme)


Chetwynd, G. R.
Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D. (Pollck)
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.


Churchill, Rt. Hon W. S.
Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)
Levy, B. W.


Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.
Ganley, Mrs. C. S.
Lewis, J. (Bolton)


Cluse, W S.
Gates, Maj. E. E.
Lewis, T. (Southampton)


Cocks, F. S.
Gibbins, J.
Lindgren, G. S.


Coldrick, W.
Glanville, J. E. (Consett)
Lipson, D. L.


Collindridge, F.
Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.
Lipton., Lt.-Col. M.


Collins V. J.
Gordon-Walker, P. C.
Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)


Comyns, Dr. L.
Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)
Logan, D. G.


Conant, Maj. R. J. E.
Grey, C. F.
Longden, F.




Low, A. R. W.
Pearson, A.
Swingler, S.


Lucas-Tooth, S. H.
Peart, T. F.
Sylvester, G. O.


Lyne, A. W.
Perrins, W.
Symonds, A. L.


MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.
Ponsonby, Col. C. E.
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd'E'n, S.)


McCallum, Maj. D.
Poole, O. B. S (Osweslry)
Taylor, H B. (Mansfield)


McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S.
Popplewell, E.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)


McFarlane, C. S.
Porter, E. (Warrington)
Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)


McGovern, J.
Porter, G. (Leeds)
Teeling, William


Mack, J. D.
Price, M. Philips
Thomas, D E. (Aberdare)


McKay, J. (Wallsend)
Proctor, W. T.
Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)


Mackeson, Brig. H. R.
Pursey, Comdr. H.
Thomas, J. P. L. (Hereford)


McKie, J H. (Galloway)
Ramsay, Maj. S.
Thorneycroft, G. E. P. (Monmouth)


Maclay, Hon. J. S.
Randall, H. E
Thurtle, Ernest


Maclean, N. (Govan)
Ranger, J.
Tolley, L


MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Reed, Sir S. (Aylesbury)
Tomlinson, Rt. Hon. G.


Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)
Rees-Williams, D. R.
Touche, G. C


Macpherson, T. (Romford)
Reeves, J.
Turner-Samuels, M.


Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)
Raid, T. (Swindon)
Turton, R. H.


Mann, Mrs. J.
Renton, D.
Vane. W. M. F.


Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)
Rhodes, H.
Vernon, Maj. W. F.


Marshall, D. (Bodmin)
Ridealgh, Mrs. M.
Walker, G. H.


Mayhew, C. P.
Robens, A.
Walker-Smith, D.


Mellish R. J.
Robertson, Sir D. (Streatham)
Wallace, G. D. (Chislehurst)


Mellor, Sir J
Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)
Warbey, W. N.


Messer, F.
Robinson, K. (St. Pancras)
Watkins, T. E


Middleton, Mrs. L.
Rogers, C. H. R.
Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)


Mikardo, Ian
Ross, William (Kilmarnock)
Weitzman, D.


Millington, Wing-Comdr, E. R.
Scott, Lord W.
Wells, P. L. (Faversham)


Mitchison, G. R.
Scott-Elliot, W.
Wells, W. T. (Walsall)


Manslow, W.
Segal, Dr. S.
West, D. G.


Morley, R.
Shackleton, E. A A.
Wheatley, Rt. Hn. J. T. (Edinb'gh, E.)


Morris-Jones, Sir H.
Sharp, Granville
Wheatley, Colonel M J. (Dorset, E.)


Morrison, Rt. Hn. H. (Lewisham E.)
Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)
White, Sir D. (Fareham)


Morrison, Rt. Hn. W. S. (Cirencester)
Shurmer, P.
White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Mort, D. L.
Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)
White, J. B. (Canterbury)


Mart-Radclyffe, C. E.
Simmons, C. J.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W.


Moyle, A.
Skeffington, A M.
Wigg, George


Murray, J. D
Skeffington-Lodge, T. C.
Wilkes, L.


Nally, W.
Skinnard, F. W.
Wilkins, W. A.


Naylor, T. E.
Smith, C. (Colchester)
Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)


Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)
Smith, Ellis (Stake)
Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)


Nicholls, H. R (Stratford)
Smith, H. N. (Nottingham, S.)
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Nicholson, G.
Smith, S. H. (Hull, S.W.)
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Nield, B. (Chester)
Snadden, W. M.
Williams, Rt. Hon T. (Don Valley)


Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.
Snow, J. W.
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brentford)
Salley, L. J.
Williams, W. R. (Heston)


Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P. J. (Derby)
Sorensen, R. W
Willoughby de Eresby, Lord


Odey, G. W.
Soskice, Rt. Hon, Sir Frank
Wills, Mrs. E. A.


Oldfield, W. H.
Spence, H. R.
Wise, Major F. J.


Oliver, G. H.
Steele, T.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Orbach, M.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.
Woods, G. S.


Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.
York, C.


Palmer, A. M. F.
Strauss, Rt Hon. G. R. (Lambeth)
Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)


Pargiter, G. A.
Strom, Dr. B.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)
Stubbs, A. E.



Paton, J. (Norwich)
Studholme, H. G.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Peake, Rt. Hon. O.
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. Edith
Mr. Hannan and Mr. Bowden.




NOES


Davies, Rt. Kn. Clement (Montgomery)
Kendall, W. D
Wadsworth, G.


George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)
McGhee, H. G.



Gruflydd, Prof. W. J.
Medlicott, Brigadier F.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Harris, H. Wilson (Cambridge Univ.)
Morris, Hopkin (Carmarthen)
Mr. Frank Byers and


Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, W.)
Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)
Mr. Wilfrid Roberts.


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayr)
Scollen, T.



Third and Fourth Resolutions agreed to.

Fifth Resolution [Wines (Customs)] read a Second time.

Question "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said

Resolution" put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions).

The House divided: Ayes, 380; Noes, 20.

Division No. 101.]
AYES
[3.39 p.m.


Acland, Sir Richard
Amory, D. Heathcoat
Awbery, S. S.


Adams, Richard (Balham)
Anderson, A. (Motherwell)
Ayles, W. H.


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Assheton, Rt. Hon. R.
Bacon, Miss A.


Albu, A. H.
Astor, Hon. M.
Baird, J.


Alexander, Rt Hon. A. V.
Attewall, H. C.
Baldwin, A. E


Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)
Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Balfour, A.


Alpass, J. H.
Austin, H. Lewis
Barlow, Sir J.




Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J.
Edwards, Rt. Hon. N (Caerphilly
Kinley, J.


Barstow, P. G.
Edwards, W J. (Whitechapel)
Kirkwood, Rt. Hon. D.


Barton, C.
Evans, John (Ogmore)
Lancaster, Col. C. G


Battley, J. R.
Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)
Lang, G.


Baxter, A. B.
Ewart, R.
Langford-Holt, J


Beamish, Maj. T. V. H.
Farthing, W. J.
Lavers, S.


Bechervaise, A. E.
Fernyhough, E.
Lawson, Rt. Hon J. J


Benson, G.
Field, Capt W. J.
Lee, F. (Hulme)


Binns, J.
Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.


Birch, Nigel
Foot, M. M.
Levy, B. W.


Blackburn, A. R.
Forman, J. C.
Lewis, J. (Bolton)


Boardman, H.
Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)
Lewis, T (Southampton)


Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)
Fraser, Sir I. (Lansdale)
Lindgren, G S


Bossom, A. C.
Fraser, T (Hamilton)
Lindsay, M. (Solihull)


Bottomley, A. G.
Freeman, J (Watford)
Lipson, D. L.


Bower, N.
Freeman, Peter (Newport)
Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.


Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M
Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew E.)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl. Exch'ge)
Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)


Bramall, E. A.
Galbraith, Cmdr T D. (Pollok)
Logan, D. G.


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W.
Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)
Longden, F


Brook, D. (Halifax)
Ganley, Mrs. C. S
Low, A. R. W.


Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)
Gates, Maj. E. E.
Lucas-Tooth, S. H


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Gibbins, J
Lyne, A. W.


Brown, George (Belper)
Glanville, J. E. (Consell)
MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.


Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.
McCallum, Maj. D.


Brown, W. J. (Rugby)
Gooch, E. G.
McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M S.


Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.
Gordon-Walker, P. C
McFarlane, C. S.


Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)
McGovern, J.


Bullock, Capt. M.
Grey, C. F.
Mack, J. D.


Burden, T. W.
Grierson, E.
McKay, J. (Wallsend)


Burke, W. A.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llonelly)
Mackeson, Brig. H. R.


Butcher, H. W.
Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)
McKie, J. H. (Galloway)


Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)
Grimston R. V.
Maclay, Hon. J. S.


Callaghan, James
Guest, Of L. Haden
MacLeod, J.


Carson, E
Gumer, R J
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Hale, Leslie
Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)


Chater, D
Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil
Macpherson, T. (Romford)


Chetwynd, G. R.
Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R.
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)


Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G
Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)
Mann, Mrs. J.


Cluse, W. S
Hardman, D R.
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.


Cocks, F. S.
Hardy, E. A
Marshall, D. (Bodmin)


Coldrick, W.
Harris, H. Wilson (Cambridge Univ)
Mayhew, C. P.


Cellindridge, F.
Harrison, J.
Mellish, R. J.


Collins, V. J.
Harvey, Air-Comdre. A. V.
Mellor, Sir J.


Colman, Miss G. M.
Haughton, S G
Messer, F.


Comyns, Dr. L.
Haworth, J
Middleton, Mrs L


Conant, Maj. R. J. E
Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C.
Mikardo, Ian


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Kingswinford)
Mitchison, G. R.


Cove, W. G.
Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)
Wilson, A. H. E.


Crawley, A.
Herbison, Miss M.
Winslow, W.


Cripps, Rt. Hon. Sir S.
Hewitson, Capt. M
Morley, R.


Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon H F C.
Hobson, C. R.
Morris-Jones, Sir H.


Crosthwaite-Ere, Col. O. E
Hogg, Hon. Q.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Lewisham, E.)


Crowder, Capt. John E
Hollis, M. C.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (C'ne'ster)


C[...]thbert, W. N.
Holman, P.
Mort, D. L.


Daggar, G.
Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)
Molt-Radclyfle, C E.


Daines, P.
Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)
Moyle, A.


Dalton, Rt. Hon H.
Horabin, T L
Murray, J. D.


Darling, Sir W Y.
Houghton, A. L N D
Nally, W.


Davidson, Viscountess
Hay, J.
Naylor, T. E.


Davies, Edward (Burslem)
Hudson, Rt. Hon R S. (Southport)
Nichol, Mrs. M. E (Bradford, N.)


Davies, Haydn (St. Pancras, S.W.)
Hughes, H. D. (W'lverh'pton W)
Nicholls, H. R (Stratford)


Deer, G.
Hurd, A.
Nicholson, G.


de Freitas, Geoffrey
Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)
Nield, B. (Chester)


De la Bore, R.
Hutchison, Lt.-Cm. Clark (E'b'rgh W.)
Noble, Comdr A. H. P.


Delargy, H. J.
Hutchison, Col. J. R. (Glasgow, C.)
Noel-Baker, Capt F E. (Brantford)


Diamond, J.
Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P J. (Derby)


Digby, Simon Wingfield
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Odey, G. W.


Dobbie, W.
Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)
Oldfield, W H.


Dodds, N. N.
Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Oliver, G H


Dodds-Parker, A. D.
Jay, D. P. T.
Orbach, M


Donner, P. W.
Jeffreys, General Sir G.
Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)


Donovan, T
Jeger, G. (Winchester)
Palmer, A. M. F


Dower, Col. A. V. G. (Penrith)
Jager, Dr. S. W. (St. Pancras, S.E.)
Pargiter, G. A.


Drewe, C.
Jenkins, R H.
Paton, Mrs. F (Rushcliffe)


Driberg, T. E. N.
Johnston, Douglas
Paton, J. (Norwich)


Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)
Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)
Peake, Rt. Hon. O.


Dugdale, Maj. Sir T. (Richmond)
Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)
Pearson, A.


Dumpleton, C. W.
Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)
Pearl, T. F


Dye, S.
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.
Perrins, W.


Eccles, D. M.
Keeling, E. H.
Ponsonby, Col. C E


Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Keenan, W.
Poole, O. B S (Oswestry)


Eden, Rt. Hon. A.
Kenyon, C.
Popplewell, E


Edwards, Rt. Hon. Sir C. (Bedwllty)
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.
Porter, E. (Warrington)


Edwards, John (Blackburn)
Kinghorn, Sqn.-Ldr. E
Porter. G. (Leeds)







Price, M. Philips
Salley, L. J.
Warbey, W. N.


Proctor, W. T.
Sorensen, R. W.
Watkins, T. E.


Pursey, Comdr. H
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank
Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)


Ramsay, Maj. S.
Spence, H. R.
Weitzman, D.


Randall, H. E.
Steele, T.
Wells, P. L. (Faversham)


Ranger, J.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M
Wells, W. T. (Walsall)


Rankin, J.
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.
West, D. G.


Reed, Sir S. (Aylesbury)
Strauss, Rt. Hon. G R. (Lamoeth)
Wheatley, Rt. Hn. J. T.(Edinb'gh, E.)


Rees-Williams, D. R.
Stress, Dr. B.
Wheatley, Colonel M. J. (Dorsel, E.)


Reeves, J.
Stubbs, A. E.
White, Sir D. (Fareham)


Reid, T. (Swindon)
Studholme, H. G.
White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Rhodes, H.
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. Edith
White, J. B. (Canterbury)


Ridealgh, Mrs. M.
Swingler, S.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W


Robens, A.
Sylvester, G. O.
Wigg, George


Robertson, Sir D. (Streatham)
Symonds, A. L.
Wilkes, L.


Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd't'n, S)
Wilkins, W. A.


Robinson, K. (St. Pancras)
Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)
Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)


Robinson, Roland (Blackpool, S.)
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)
Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)


Rogers, G. H. R.
Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Ross, William (Kilmarnock)
Tooling, William
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Scott, Lord W.
Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Scott-Elliot, W.
Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Segal, Dr. S
Thomas, J. P. L. (Hereford)
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


Shackleton, E. A. A.
Thorneycroft, G. E. P. (Monmouth)
Williams, W. R. (Heston)


Sharp, Granville
Thurtle, Ernest
Willoughby de Eresby, Lord


Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)
Tolley, L.
Wills, Mrs. E. A.


Shurmer, P.
Tomlinson, Rt. Hon. G.
Wise, Major F. J.


Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)
Touche, G. C.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Simmons, C. J.
Turner-Samuels, M.
Woods, G. S.


Skeffington, A. M.
Ungoed-Thomas, L.
York, C.


Skeffington-Lodge, T. C.
Vane, W. M. F.
Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)


Skinnard, F. W.
Vernon, Maj. W. F.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Smith, C. (Colchester)
Walker, G. H.



Smith, S. H. (Hull, S.W.)
Walker-Smith, D
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Snadden, W. M
Wallace, G. D. (Chislehurst)
Mr. Hannan and Mr. Bowden.


Snow, J. W.
Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)





NOES


Bowen, R.
Kendall, W. D.
Scollan, T.


Davies, Rt. Hn. Clement (Montgomery)
McGhee, H. G.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke)


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)
Smith, H. N. (Nottingham, S.)


Gallacher, W.
Medlicott, Brigadier F.
Wadsworth, G.


George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)
Morris, Hopkin (Carmarthen)



Gruffydd, Prof. W. J.
Piratin, P.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Hudson, J. H. (Eating, W.)
Renton, D.
Mr. Frank Byers and


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayr)
Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)
Mr. Wilfrid Roberts.


Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Resolutions agreed to.

Ninth Resolution [Matches (Customs)] read a Second time.

Question, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolu-

tion," put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions).

The House divided: Ayes. 277 Noes, 137.

Division No. 102.]
AYES
[3.54 p.m.


Acland, Sir Richard
Braddock, Mrs. E. M (L'pl.Exch'ge)
Comyns, Dr. L


Adams, Richard (Balham)
Bramall, E. A.
Cooper, G.


Albu, A. H.
Brook, D. (Halifax)
Cove, W. G.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V
Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)
Crawley, A.


Allen, A. C. (Bosworth)
Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Cullen, Mrs.


Anderson, A. (Motherwell)
Brown, George (Belper)
Dagger, G.


Attewell, H. C.
Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Daines, P.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R
Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.
Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.


Awbery, S. S.
Burden, T. W.
Davies, Edward (Burslem)


Ayles, W. H.
Burke, W. A.
Davies, Haydn (St. Pancras, S.W.)


Bacon, Miss A.
Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)
Deer, G.


Baird, J
Callaghan, James
de Freitas, Geoffrey


Balfour, A.
Carmichael, James
Delargy, H. J.


Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J.
Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Diamond, J.


Barstow, P. G.
Chamberlain, R. A.
Debbie, W.


Barton, C.
Chafer, D.
Dodds, N. N


Battley, J. R.
Clsetwynd, G. R.
Donovan, T.


Bechervaise, A. E.
Cluse, W S
Driberg, T. E. N.


Benson, G.
Cocks, F. S.
Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)


Binns, J.
Coldrick, W.
Dumpleton, C. W.


Blackburn, A. R
Collindridge, F.
Dye, S.


Blyton, W. R.
Collins, V. J.
Ede, Rt. Hen. J. C.


Bottomley, A G.
Colman, Miss G. M.
Edelman, M.




Edwards, Rt. Hon. Sir C. (Bedwellty)
Lawson, Rt. Hon. J. J.
Ross, William (Kilmarnock)


Edwards, John (Blackburn)
Lee, F. (Hulme)
Scott-Elliot, W.


Edwards, Rt. Hon. N. (Caerphilly)
Lee, Miss J. (Cannock)
Segal, Dr S.


Edwards, W J. (Whitechapel)
Levy, B. W.
Shackleton, E. A. A.


Evans, Albert (Islington, W.)
Lewis, J. (Bolton)
Sharp, Granville


Evans, E. (Lowestoft)
Lewis, T. (Southampton)
Shurmer, P.


Evans, John (Ogmore)
Lindgren, G. S.
Silverman, J. (Erdington)


Evans, S N. (Wednesbury)
Lipton, Lt.-Col. M
Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)


Ewart, R.
Logan, D. G.
Simmons, C. J.


Farthing, W. J.
Longden, F.
Skeffington, A. M.


Field, Capt. W. J.
Lyne, A. W.
Skeffington-Lodge, T C.


Fletcher, E G. M. (Islington, E.)
McAllister, G.
Skinnard, F. W.


Foot, M. M.
McGovern,J.
Smith, C. (Colchester)


Forman, J C.
Mack, J. D.
Smith, S H. (Hull, S.W.)


Fraser, T (Hamilton)
McKay, J. (Wallsend)
Snow, J. W


Freeman, J. (Watford)
Maclean, N. (Govan)
Sorensen, R. W


Freeman, Peter (Newport)
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank


Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N
Macpherson, T. (Romford)
Steele, T.


Ganley, Mrs. C. S.
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.


Gibbins, J
Mann, Mrs. J.
Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. (Lambeth, N.)


Gilzean, A.
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A
Stross, Dr. B.


Glanville, J. E. (Consett)
Mathers, Rt. Hon. George
Stubbs, A. E.


Gooch, E. G.
Mayhew, C. P.
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. Edith


Gordon-Walker, P. C.
Mellish, R. J.
Swingler, S.


Greenwood, A. W. J. (Haywood)
Messer, F.
Sylvester, G. O.


Grey, C. F.
Middleton, Mrs. L.
Symonds, A. L.


Grierson, E.
Mitchison, G. R.
Taylor, H B (Mansfield)


Griffiths, D. (Rather Valley)
Monslow, W.
Taylor, R J. (Morpeth)


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanolly)
Moody, A. S.
Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)


Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)
Morley, R.
Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)


Guest, Dr. L. Haden
Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)
Thomas, George (Cardiff)


Gunter, R. J
Morrison, Rt. Hn. H. (Lewisham, E.)
Thurtle, Ernest


Hale, Leslie
Mort, D. L.
Timmons, J.


Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil
Moyle, A.
Telley, L.


Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R.
Murray, J. D.
Tomlinson, Rt Hon. G


Hardman, D R.
Naylor, T. E.
Turner-Samuels, M.


Hardy, E. A
Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)
Ungoed-Thomas, L.


Harris, M. Wilson (Cambridge Univ.)
Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)
Vernon, Maj. W. F.


Harrison, J
Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brantford)
Walker, G. H.


Haworth, J
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P. J. (Derby)
Wallace, G. D. (Chislehurst)


Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Kingswinford)
Oldfield, W. H.
Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstow, E.)


Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)
Oliver, G. H.
Watkins, T. E


Herbison, Miss M.
Orbach, M.
Webb, M (Bradford, C.)


Hewitson, Capt. M
Paget, R. T.
Weitzman, D.


Hebson, C. R.
Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)
Wells, P. L. (Faversham)


Holman, P
Palmer, A. M. F.
Wells, W. T. (Walsall)


Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)
Pargiter, G. A.
West, D G.


Horabin, T. L.
Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)
Wheatley, Rt. Hn. J. T (Edinb'gh, E.)


Houghton, A. L N. D
Paton, J. (Norwich)
White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Hoy, J.
Pearson, A.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon W


Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, W.)
Peart, T. F.
Wigg, George


Hughes, H D. (W'lverh'[...]ton, W.)
Perrins, W.
Wilkes, L.


Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)
Popplewell, E.
Wilkins, W. A.


Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Porter, E. (Warrington)
Willey, F T (Sunderland)


Irvine, A. J. (Liverpool)
Porter, G. (Leeds)
Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)


Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)
Price, M. Philips
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Proctor, W. T.
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Jay, D. P. T.
Pursey, Comdr. H.
Williams, Fit Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Jeger, G. (Winchester)
Randall, H. E.
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


Jeger, Dr S. W (St. Pancras, S.E.)




Jenkins, R. H.
Ranger, J
Williams, W. R. (Heston)


Johnston, Douglas
Rees-Williams, D. R.
Willis, E


Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)
Reeves, J.
Wills, Mrs. E. A.


Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)
Reid, T. (Swindon)
Wise, Major F J.


Kenyon, C.
Rhodes, H.
Woodburn, Rt Hon. A.


Key, Rt Hon. C. W.
Ridealgh, Mrs. M.
Woods, G. S


King, E M.
Roberts, A.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Kenley, J.
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)
Zilliacus, K.


Kirkwood, Rt. Hon. D
Robertson, J.J. (Berwick)



Lang, G.
Robinson, K. (St. Pancras)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Lavers, S.
Rogers, G. H. R.
Mr. Hannan and Mr. Bowden.




NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Bossom, A. C.
Carson, E


Amory, D Heathcoat
Bowen, R.
Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.


Assheton, Rt. Hon. R
Bower, N.
Cooper-Key, E. M


Astor, Hon. M.
Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. F. C.


Austin, H. Lewis
Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W.
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.


Baldwin, A. E
Brown, W J. (Rugby)
Crowder, Capt. John E


Barlow, Sir J.
Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Cuthbert, W. N.


Beamish, Maj. T. V. H
Bullock. Capt. M
Darling, Sir W Y.


Birch, Nigel
Butcher, H. W.
Davidson, Viscountess


Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)
Byers, Frank
Davies, Rt. Hn. Clement (Montgomery)







De la Bere, R.
Lancaster, Col. C. G
Ponsonby, Col. C. E.


Digby, Simon Wingfield
Langford-Holt, J.
Poole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)


Dodds-Parker, A. D.
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.
Ramsay, Maj. S.


Donner, P. W
Lindsay, M. (Solihull)
Renton, D.


Dower, Col. A. V. G. (Penrith)
Lipson, D. L.
Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)


Drewe, C.
Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Roberts, W. (Cumberlan, N.)


Dugdale, Mai. Sir T. (Richmond)
Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)
Robertson, Sir D. (Streatham)


Duthie, W. S.
Low, A. R. W.
Robinson, Roland (Blackpool, S.)


Eccles, D. M.
Lucas-Tooth, S. H.
Scott, Lord W.


Eden, Rt. Hon. A.
MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.
Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)


Follick, M.
McCallum, Maj. D.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke)


Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)
McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S.
Smith, H. N. (Nottingham S.)


Fraser, Sir I. (Lonsdale)
McFarlane, C. S.
Smithers, Sir W.


Fyle, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.
Mackeson, Brig. H. R.
Spearman, A. C. M.


Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D. (Pottok)
McKie, J. H. (Galloway)
Spence, H. R.


Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)
Mactay, Hon. J. S.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.


Gallacher, W.
MaoLeod, J.
Studholme, H. G.


Gates, Maj. E E.
Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd't'n, S.)


George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)
Manning, C. (Camberwell, N.)
Teeling, William


Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.
Marlowe, A A. H.
Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)


Grimston, R. V.
Marshall, D. (Bodmin)
Thomas, J. P L. (Hereford)


Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)
Mellor, Sir J.
Thorneycroft, G. E. P. (Monmouth)


Harvey, Air-Comdre. A. V.
Mikardo, Ian
Touche, G. C


Haughton, S. G.
Molson, A. H. E.
Tinton, R. H.


Headlam, Lieut -Col. Rt. Hon. Sir G
Moore, Lt.-Col. Sir T.
Vane, W. M. F.


Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Morris, Hopkin (Carmarthen)
Wadsworth, G.


Hogg, Hon. Q.
Morris-Jones, Sir H.
Walker-Smith, D.


Hollis, M. C.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)
White, Sir D (Fareham)


Holmes, Sir J Stanley (Harwich)
Mott-Radclyffe, C. E.
White, J. B. (Canterbury)


Hudson, Rt. Hon R. S. (Southport)
Nally, W.
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Hurd, A
Nicholson, G.
Willoughby de Eresby, Lord


Hutchison, Lt.-Cm. Clark (E'b'rgh W.)
Nield, B. (Chester)
York, C.


Hutchison, Col. J. R. (Glasgow, C.)
Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.
Young, Sir A. S. L. (Partick)


Jeffreys, General Sir G.
Odey, G. W.



Joynson-Micks, Hon. L. W.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Keeling, E. H.
Peaks, Rt. Hon. O.
Major Conant and Colonel Wheatley.


Kendall, W. D.
Piratin, P.

Tenth to Twenty-third agreed to.

Twenty-fourth Resolution 9Eatate Duty (Rates)] read a Second time

Question, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the Committee in the said Resolu-

tion," put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions).

The House divided: Ayes, 309; Noes, 121.

Division No. 103.]
AYES
[3.54 p.m.


Acland, Sir Richard
Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Delargy, H. J.


Adams, Richard (Batham)
Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.
Diamond, J.


Albu, A. H.
Burden, T. W.
Dobbie, W.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V
Burke, W. A.
Dodds, N. N.


Alien, A. C. (Bosworth)
Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)
Driberg, T. E. N.


Alpass, J. H.
Byers, Frank
Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)


Anderson, A. (Motherwell)
Callaghan, James
Dumplelon, C. W.


Attewell, H. C.
Carmichael, James
Dye, S.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C.


Austin, H. Lewis
Chamberlain R. A.
Edelman, M.


Awbery, S S.
Chater, D.
Edwards, Rt. Hon. Sir C. (Bedwellty)


Ryles, W. H.
Chetwynd, G. R.
Edwards, John (Blackburn)


Bacon, Miss A.
Cluse, W. S.
Edwards, Rt. Hon N. (Caerphilly)


Baird, J.
Cocks, F. S.
Edwards, W. J. (Whilechapel)


Balfour, A.
Coldrick, W.
Evans, Albert (Islington, W.)


Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J
Collindridge, F.
Evans, E. (Lowestoft)


Barstow, P. G.
Collins V. J.
Evans, John (Ogmore)


Barton, C.
Colman, Miss G. M.
Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)


Battley, J. R.
Comyns, Dr. L.
Ewarl, R.


Bechervaise, A. E.
Cooper, G.
Farthing, W. J.


Benson, G.
Cove, W. G.
Fernyhough, E.


Binns, J.
Crawley, A.
Field, Capt. W. J.


Blackburn, A. R.
Cullen, Mrs.
Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington, E.)


Blyton, W. R.
Daggar, G.
Follick, M.


Bottomley, A. G.
Daises, P.
Foot., M. M.


Bowen, R.
Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.
Forman, J C.


Braddock, Mrs. E. M. (L'pl. Exch'ge)
Davies, Rt. Hn. Clement (Montgomery)
Fraser, T. (Hamilton)


Braddock, T. (Mitcham)
Davies, Edward (Burslem)
Freeman, J. (Watford)


Braman, E. A.
Davies, Haydn (St. Pancras, S.W.)
Freeman, Peter (Newport)


Brook, D. (Halifax)
Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H T [...]


Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)
Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Gallacher, W.


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Deer, G.
Conley, Mrs. C. S.


Brown, George (Belper)
de Freitas, Geoffrey
George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)




Gibbins, J.
McGovern, J.
Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)


Gilzean, A.
Mack, J. D.
Simmons, C. J.


Glanville, J. E. (Conse[...])
McKay, J. (Wallsend)
Skeffington, A. M.


Gooch, E. G.
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)
Skeffington-Lodge, T. C


Gordon-Walker, P. C.
Macpherson, T. (Romford)
Skinnard; F. W.


Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)
Smith, C. (Calchester)


Grey, C. F.
Mann, Mrs. J.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke)


Grierson, E.
Manning, Mrs. L. (Epping)
Smith, H. N. (Nottingham, S.)


Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.
Smith, S. H..(Hull, S.W.)


Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanelly)
Mathers, Rt. Hon. George
Snow, J. W.


Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)
Mayhew, C. P.
Solley, L. J.


Guest, Dr L. Haden.
Mellish, R. J
Sorensen, R. W.


Gunter, R. J.
Messer, F.
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank


Hale, Leslie
Middleton, Mrs. L.
Sparks, J. A.


Hall, Rt. Hon. Glenvil
Mikardo, Ian
Steele, T.


Hamilton, Lieut.-Col. R.
Mitchison., G. R.
Strachey, Rt. Mon. J.


Hardman, D. R.
Monslow, W.
Strauss. Rt. Hon. G R. (Lambeth)


Hardy, E. A.
Moody, A. S.
Stress, Dr. B.


Harrison, J.
Morley, R.
Stubbs, A. E.


Haworth, J
Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. Edith


Henderson, Rt. Hon. A. (Kingswinford)
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Lewisham, E)
Swingler, S.


Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)
Mort, D. L.
Sylvester, G. O.


Herbison, Miss M.
Moyle, A.
Symonds, A.L.


Hewitson, Capt. M
Murray, J. D.
Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)


Hobson, C. R.
Nally, W.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)


Holman, P.
Naylor, T. E.
Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)


Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)
Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)
Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)


Horabin, T L.
Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)
Thomas, George (Cardiff)


Houghton, A. L. N. D
Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brantford)
Thurtle, Ernest


Hoy, J.
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P. (Derby)



Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, W.)
Oldfield., W. H.
Timmons, J.


Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayr)
Oliver, G. H.
Tolley, L.


Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Orbach, M.
Tomlinson, Rt. Hon. G


Hughes, H D. (W[...]lverh'pton, W)
Paget, R. T.
Turner-Samuels, M.


Hutchinson H. L. (Rusholme)
Paling, Will T. (Dewsbury)
Ungoed-Thomas, L.


Hynd, H. (Hackney, C.)
Palmer, A. M. F.
Vernon, Maj. W. F.


Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Pargiter, G. A.
Wadsworth, G.


Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)
Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)
Walker, G. H.


Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Paton, J. (Norwich)
Wallace, G. D. (Chislehurst)


Jay, D. P. T.
Pearson, A.
Wallace, H. W. (Walthamstew, E.)


Jeger, G. (Winchester)
Pearl, T. F.
Warbey, W. N.


Jeger, Dr S. W. (St. Pancras, S.E)
Perrins, W.
Watkins, T. E.


Jenkins, R. H.
Piratin, P.
Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)


Johnston, Douglas
Popplewell, E.
Weitzman, D.


Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)
Porter, E. (Warrington)
Wells, P. L. (Faversham)


Jones, Elwyn (Plaistow)
Porter, G. (Leeds)
Wells, W. T. (Walsall)


Jones, P. Asterley (Hitchin)
Price, M. Philips
West, D. G.


Keenan, W.
Proctor, W. T.
Wheatley, Rt. Hn. J. T. (Edinb'gh, E.)


Kendall, W. D.
Pursey, Comdr. H.
While, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Kenyon, C.
Randall, H. E.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W


Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.
Ranger, J.
Wigg, George


King, E. M.
Rees-Williams, D. R.
Wilkes, L.


Kinley, J.
Reeves, J.
Wilkins, W A.


Kirkwood, Rt. Hon. D.
Reid, T. (Swindon)
Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)


Lang, G.
Rhodes, H.
Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)


Lavers, S.
Ridealgh, Mrs. M
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Lawson, Rt. Hon J. J.
Robens, A.
Williams, J. L. (Kelvingrove)


Lee, F. (Hulme)
Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Lee, Miss J. (Cannock)
Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonshire)
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Lever, N. H.
Roberts, W. (Cumberland, N.)
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


Levy, B. W.
Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)
Williams, W. R. (Heston)




Willis, E.


Lewis, J. (Bolton)
Robinson, K. (St. Pancras)
Wills, Mrs. E. A.


Lewis, T. (Southampton)
Rogers, G. H. R.
Wise, Major F. J.


Lindgren, G. S.
Ross, William (Kilmarnock)
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Lipson, D. L.
Scollan, T.
Woods, G. S.


Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.
Sco.[...]Elliot, W.
Yates, V. F.


Logan, D. G.
Segal, Dr. S.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Longden, F.
Shackleton, E. A. A.
Zilliacus, K.


Lyne, A. W.
Sharp, Granville



McAllister, G.
Shurmer, P.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


McGhee, H. G.
Silverman, J. (Erdington)
Mr. Hannan and Mr. Bowden.




NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Bossom, A. C.
Cooper-Key, E. M


Amory, D. Heathcoat
Bower, N.
Crookshank, Capt. Rt.Hon. H. D. C.


Assheton, RI. Hon. R.
Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E.


Astor, Hon. M.
Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W.
Crowder, Capt. John E.


Baldwin, A. E
Brown, W. J. (Rugby)
Cothbert, W. N.


Barlow, Sir J.
Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Darling, Sir W Y.


Baxter, A. B
Bullock, Capt. M.
Davidson, Viscountess


Beamish, Maj. A V. H
Butcher, H. W.
Do la Bere, R.


Birch, Nigel
Carson, E.
Digby, Simon Wingfield


Boles Lt.-Col. D. C. (Welts)
Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.
Dodds-Parker, A. D.







Donner, P. W
Law, Rt. Hon. R. K.
Poole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)


Dower, Col. A. V. G. (Pentith)
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H
Ramsay, Maj. S.


Drewe, C.
Lindsay, M. (Solihull)
Reed, Sir S. (Aylesbury)


Dugdale, Maj. Sir T. (Richmond)
Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Renton, D.


Duthie, W. S.
Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)
Robertson, Sir D. (Streatham)


Eccles, D. M.
Low, A. R. W.
Robinson, Roland (Blackpool, S.)


Eden, Rt. Hon. A.
Lucas-Tooth, S. H.
Scott, Lord W.


Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)
MacAndrew, Sir C.
Shepherd, W S. (Bucklow)


Fraser, Sir I. (Lansdale)
McCallum, Maj. D.
Smithers, Sir W.


Fyfe, Rt Hon. Sir D. P. M.
MoCoreuodate, Rt. Hon. M. S.
Snadden, W. M.


Galbraith, Cmdr. T D. (Pollok)
MacDonald, Sir M. (Inverness)
Spearman, A. C. M.


Galbraith, T G. D. (Hillhead)
McFarlane, C. S.
Spence, H. R.


Gates, Maj. E. E.
Mackeson, Brig. H. R.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.


Gomme-Duncan, Col. A
McKie, J. H. (Galloway)
Studholme, H. G.


Grimston, R. V.
Maclay, Hoc. J. S.
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (P'dd'tn, S.)


Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)
MaoLeod, J.
Teeling, William


Harris, H. Wilson (Cambridge Univ.)
Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)
Thomas, Ivor (Keighley)


Harvey, Air-Comdre. A. V
Marlowe, A. A H.
Thomas, J. P. L. (Hereford)


Haughton, S G.
Marshall, D. (Bodmin)
Thorneycroft, G. E. P. (Monmouth)


Headlam, Lieut -Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C
Mellor, Sir J.
Touche, G. C.


Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Molson, A. H. E.
Turton, R. H.


Hollis, M. C.
Moore, Lt.-Col. Sir T.
Vane, W. M. F.


Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)
Morrison, Rt. Hn. W. S. (Cirencester)
Walker-Smith, D.


Hudson, Rt. Hon. R. S. (Southport)
Mott-Radclyffe, C. E.
White, Sir D. (Fareham)


Hurd, A.
Nicholson, G.
White, J. B. (Canterbury)


Hutchison, Lt.-Cm. Clark (E'b'rgh W.)
Nield, B (Chester)
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Hutchison, Col. J. R. (Glasgow, C.)
Noble, Comdr. A. H. P.
Willoughby de Eresby, Lord


Jeffreys, General Sir G.
Odey, G. W.
York, C.


Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H
Young, Sir A. S. L. (Pertick)


Keeling, E. H.
Peake, Rt. Hon. O.



Lancaster, Col C. G
Ponsonby, Col. C E
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:




Major Conant and Colonel Wheatley.


Resolution agreed to.

Orders of the Day — FINANCE [MONEY]

Resolution reported:
That it is expedient to authorise the issue out of the Consolidated Fund—

(a) of the sum of four hundred and eighty-five million pounds for the permanent annual charge for the National Debt for the current financial year, instead of the sum of three hundred and fifty-five million pounds; and
(b) of sums required in connection with the redemption, by the transfer of Government stock or otherwise, of the annuities now payable in respect of land tax redeemed but not exonerated."

Orders of the Day — WAYS AND MEANS

[12th April]

Resolution reported.
That it is expedient to amend the law with respect to the National Debt and the public revenue (other than purchase tax), and to make further provision in connection with finance.

Bill ordered to be brought in upon the said Resolution and upon the other Resolutions reported from the Committee of Ways and Means and the Resolution reported from the Committee on Finance [Money], and agreed to this day, by the

Chairman of Ways and Means, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Glenvil Hall and Mr. Jay.

Orders of the Day — FINANCE BILL

"to grant certain duties, to alter other duties and to amend the law relating to the National Debt and the Public Revenue (other than Purchase Tax), and to make further provision in connection with Finance," presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Tuesday, 26th April, and to be printed. [Bill 115.]

Orders of the Day — IRON AND STEEL BILL (ALLOCATION OF TIME)

Report [7th April] of the Business Committee considered.— [Mr. H. Morrison.]

4.18 p.m.

Mr. Osbert Peake: Mr. Speaker, before you put the next Question, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Report," which under Standing Order No. 41 (3) is not debatable, I wish to raise a point of Order to the effect that the Business Committee have acted ultra vires in reporting to this House that the Guillotine Motion for the Report stage of the Iron and Steel Bill should sub-divide the four allotted days and that the Guillotine should fall twice daily and not merely at the end of each day's proceedings. This point is, of course, novel since this


is the first occasion on which the machinery in which the Business Committee established by the new Standing Order 41 in July last year, has been used. It is also, I think, important because your Ruling upon this matter, Mr. Speaker, will set a precedent which will, no doubt, be followed in the future.
The point I wish to raise turns upon the construction of Standing Order 41 (1). But before I read the terms of the Standing Order may I just remind you, Sir, that this Standing Order was adopted nine months ago on the Motion of the Government and in the face of opposition from these benches. The Government are responsible for its form and, in my submission to you, Sir, if there is any doubt as to its meaning it should therefore be construed strictly against the Government rather than strictly against the Opposition. The Report from the Business Committee provides, as I have just stated, that the Guillotine shall fall at varying hours upon the four allocated days. The Standing Order under which the Business Committee have to proceed reads as follows:
There shall be a committee, to be designated the business committee, consisting of the members of the chairmen's panel together with not more than five other members to be nominated by Mr. Speaker. The quorum of the Committee shall be seven.
That provides, of course, that supporters of the Government are bound to be in a permanent majority upon the Business Committee and, of course, we make no complaint about that, for it is the fact with all Select Committees appointed by this House. The Standing Order goes on to provide:
The committee (1) shall, in the case of any bill in respect of which an order has been made by the House, allotting a specified number of days or portions of days to the consideration of the bill in committee of the whole House or on report, divide the bill into such parts as they may see fit and allot to each part so many days or portions of a day so allotted as they may consider appropriate;
The first point I would make is that paragraph (1) of Standing Order 41 can only be operated where the House has made an Order allotting a specified number of days or portions of days to consideration of a Bill, and on 25th November last this House did pass such an Order, which, as regards the Report stage, states merely:

Four allotted days shall be given to the Report stage (including any proceedings on the re-committal of the Bill).
The Order does not provide that any portions of a day or portions of days shall be allotted to the Report stage. No 'doubt, of course, those words are included in the Standing Order because it is common practice in this House for, let us say, 2½ days to be allotted to the Report stage of a Bill and for half a day to be allotted to the Third Reading, but in the case which we are here discussing the allocation of time by the House was four days to the Report stage of the Bill.
I think it should also be noted that the Standing Order does not lay down that the Business Committee shall allot time to each part of the Bill; what the Standing Order lays down is that they shall allot a part of the Bill to a specified time. If I may read the words once more, they say that the duty of the Business Committee is to,
divide the bill into such parts as they may see fit—
—that is, not into such number of parts as they may see fit—
and allot to each part so many days or portions of a day so allotted as they may consider appropriate.
The words "so allotted" in that sentence refer back to the Order of the House allotting a specified number of days to the consideration of the Bill on Report, but I would point out to you, Sir, that the duty of the Business Committee is to allot parts of the Bill to the available time and not to allot the available time to parts of the Bill. This is a distinction with a great deal of difference.
I submit, Mr. Speaker, that in considering what is their duty the first thing the Business Committee have to do is to see what is the time allotted for the consideration of the Bill upon Report by the Order of the House. That is their first duty. In order to ascertain that they look at the Order of the House of 25th November last year and they see there that four days shall be allotted to the Report stage of the Bill. Passing from that point, in my submission the Business Committee should then proceed to divide the Bill into parts and allot those parts to the days or portions of a day so allotted as they may consider appropriate.
The House allotted four days and in the Order of the House of 25th November


last there is no mention whatever of a portion of a day. It is, therefore, my submission that it is the duty of the Business Committee to look at the Order of the House, to see how many days are allotted for the Report stage, to divide the Bill into either that number of parts or a smaller number of parts, and then to proceed to allocate those parts to the time which has been fixed by the House.
This is a matter of very great importance because the Report of the Business Committee, or rather the Motion to approve the Report of the Business Committee, is not debatable in this House. What is debatable in this House is the Order allocating time for the stages of the Bill and, in my submission, it would be quite wrong if the House, having allotted let us say four days to the Report stage of the Bill, the Business Committee were then to proceed to divide the Bill into 16, 32 or maybe 64 parts and allocate those parts, hour by hour, on the proceedings upon the Report stage. In my submission the effect of that would be completely to destroy the powers remitted to you, Sir, under Standing Order 31. Under that Standing Order,
Mr. Speaker…shall have power to select the new clauses or amendments to be proposed,
That gives you, Mr. Speaker, the power to select Amendments upon the Report stage and, in my submission, that is a very valuable power and a very great protection for minorities in this House when we are working under a Timetable upon the Report stage of a Bill. It is a very great protection for the minority because, without power of selection, it would be perfectly possible for Government supporters to move Amendments so as to take up the whole of the available time.
I suggest that if it is open to the Business Committee, established for the first time under Standing Order 41, to divide the Bill into innumerable parts and to provide for a Guillotine which might fall every hour or even more frequently, then your power of selection under Standing Order 31 and your responsibility to protect minorities in this House would, in effect, be completely destroyed. I, therefore, suggest that it is the duty of the Business Committee to divide the Bill only into the days allocated for Report stage by the Order of the House. If the Leader of the House wished the Business

Committee to act in a different way and to divide the Bill into more parts than the number of days allotted for Report stage, then in my submission the Order of the House fixing the time for the Report stage ought to state clearly in terms that the Business Committee may provide that the Guillotine may fall more frequently than once daily.
I think that this is a matter of very great importance. This is the first occasion upon which it has arisen. I do respectfully suggest that if there is any doubt about the construction of these words—and I submit that the construction I have put upon them is the correct one—you, Mr. Speaker, should take time to consider this matter and give a considered Ruling upon it. This is a very important precedent which is being set today. It may govern the Proceedings of this House and it may operate either to limit or to extend the powers of hon. Members to speak and debate upon Report stage for many years to come. I suggest that if, in your view, there is any reasonable doubt whatever as to the proper construction of these words in Standing Order 41 you should consider a Ruling upon it, after having taken whatever advice you think desirable.

Mr. Speaker: I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for putting his case so clearly. He has suggested that I should give a considered Ruling and that I should take time, if necessary, to consider it. I can assure him that I did spend on this matter almost the whole of one day when the House was in Committee on the Budget, for I knew that it was coming up. I read the Debate on this Order, and I have given the matter my earnest and careful consideration, because I realise it is an important point. However, I am afraid I have come to this conclusion, that I cannot accept the right hon. Gentleman's interpretation of our Standing Orders.
We must apply our minds to the obvious intention of this Order. In my opinion, Standing Order No. 41 lays it down that if the House has passed an Allocation of Time Order in respect of the proceedings on consideration of a Bill, it is the duty of the Business Committee (1) to divide the Bill into parts of such number and size as they may think fit, and (2) to decide, as they may consider appropriate, at what hour and on which of the days


allotted to the proceedings each of the parts is to be concluded. This appears to me to be the quite clear intention of the Standing Order, and the Time Table of the Business Committee's Report is, therefore, in accord with that intention.

Motion made, and Question put, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Report."—[Mr. H. Morrison.]

The House divided: Ayes 304; Noes, 133.

Division No. 104.]
AYES
[4.33 p.m.


Acland, Sir Richard
Ede., Rt. Hon. J. C.
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W


Adams, Richard (Batham)
Edwards, Rt. Hon. Sir C. (Bedwellty)
King, E. M.


Alba, A. H.
Edwards, John (Blackburn)
Kinley, J.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V
Edwards, Rt. Hon. N. (Caerphilly)
Kirkwood, Rt. Hon. D


Allen, A. C (Bosworth)
Edwards, W. J. (Whitechapel)
Lang, G.


Alpass, J. H.
Evans, Albert (Islington, W)
Lavers, S.


Anderson., A. (Motherwell)
Evans, John (Ogmore)
Lee, F. (Hulme)


Attewell, H. C.
Evans, S. N. (Wednesbury)
Lee, Miss J. (Cannock)


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Ewart, R.
Lever, N. H.


Austin, H. Lewis
Farthing, W. J.
Levy, B. W.


Awbery, S. S.
Fernybough, E
Lewis, J (Bolton)


Ayles, W. H.
Field, Capt. W. J.
Lewis, T. (Southampton)


Bacon, Miss A.
Fletcher, E. G. M. (Islington., E.)
Lindgren, G. S.


Baird, J.
Follick, M.
Lipton, LL-Col. M


Balfour, A
Foot, M. M.
Logan, D. G.


Barnes, Rt. Hon. A. J.
Forman, J. C.
Longden, F.


Barstow, P. G.
Fraser, T. (Hamilton)
Lyne, A. W.


Barton, C.
Freeman, J (Watford)
McAllister, G.


Battley, J. R.
Freeman, Peter (Newport)
McGhee, H. G


Bechervaise, A. E.
Gaitskell, Rt Hon. H. T N
McGovern, J.


Benson, G.
Gallacher, W.
Mack, J. D.


Binns, J.
Ganley, Mrs. C. S
McKay, J. (Wallsend)


Blenkinsop, A.
Gibbins, J
Maclean, N. (Govan)


Blyton, W. R.
Gilzean, A.
McLeavy, F.


Boardman, H.
Glanville, J. E. (Consent)
MacMillan, M. K. (Western Isles)


Bottomley, A. G
Gooch, E. G.
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


Braddock, Mrs, E. M. (L'pl. Exch'ge)
Gordon-Walker, P. C.
Macpherson, T (Romford)


Braddock, T. (Mitcham)
Greenwood, A. W. J. (Heywood)
Maitland, Comdr J W.


Bramall, E. A.
Grey, C. F.
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield)


Brook, D. (Halifax)
Grierson, E.
Mann, Mrs. J.


Brooks, T. J. (Rothwell)
Griffiths, D. (Rother Valley)
Manning, Mrs. L (Epping)


Broughton, Dr, A. D. D.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. J. (Llanelly)
Marquand, Rt. Hon H A


Brown, George (Belper)
Griffiths, W. D. (Moss Side)
Mathers, Rt. Hon. George


Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Guest, Dr. L. Haden
Mayhew, C. P.


Bruce, Maj. D. W. T.
Gunter, R. J.
Melfish, R. J


Burden, T. W.
Hale, Leslie
Messer, F.


Butler, H. W. (Hackney, S.)
Hall, Rt Hon. Glenvil
Middleton, Mrs. L


Callaghan, James
Hamilton, Lieut.-Col, R.
Mikardo, Ian


Carmichael, James
Hannan, W. (Maryhill)
Mitchison, G. R


Castle, Mrs, B. A.
Hardman, D. R.
Monslow, W.


Chamberlain, R. A.
Hardy, E. A.
Moody, A. S.


Chater, D.
Harrison, J.
Morley, R.


Chetwynd, G. R.
Haworth, J.
Morris, P. (Swansea, W.)


Cocks, F. S.
Henderson, Rt. Hn. A. (Kingswinford)
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Lewisham, E.)


Coldrick, W.
Henderson, Joseph (Ardwick)
Mort, D. L.


Collick, P.
Herbison, Miss M.
Moyle, A.


Collindridge, F.
Hewitson, Capt. M
Murray, J. D


Collins, V. J.
Hobson, C. R.
Nally, W.


Colman, Miss G. M.
Holman, P.
Naylor, T. E.


Comyns, Dr, L.
Holmes, H. E. (Hemsworth)
Nichol, Mrs. M. E. (Bradford, N.)


Cooper, G
Horabin, T. L.
Nicholls, H. R. (Stratford)


Cove, W. G.
Houghton, A. L N. D
Noel-Baker, Capt. F. E. (Brantford)


Crawley, A.
Hoy, J
Noel-Baker, Rt Hon. P J (Derby)


Grossman, R. H. S.
Hudson, J. H. (Ealing, W.)
Oldfield, W H


Cullen, Miss
Hughes, Emrys (S Ayr)
Oliver, G. H.


Dagger, G.
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Orbach, M.


Daines, P.
Hughes, H. D. (W'lverh'pton, W.)
Paget, R. T.


Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.
Hutchinson, H. L. (Rusholme)
Paling, Rt Hon. Wilfred (Wentworth)


Davies, Edward (Burstem)
Hynd., H. (Hackney, C.)
Paling, W T. (Dewsbury)


Davies, Haydn (St. Pancras, S.W.)
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Palmer, A. M. F


Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Irvine, A. J. (Liverpool)
Pargiter, G. A.


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Irving, W. J. (Tottenham, N.)
Paton, Mrs. F. (Rushcliffe)


Deer, G.
Isaacs, Rt Hon. G. A.
Paton, J. (Norwich)


de Freitas, Geoffrey
Jay, D. P. T.
Pearl, T. F.


Delargy, H. J
Jeger, G. (Winchester)
Perrins, W


Diamond, J.
Jeger, Dr. S. W. (St. Pancras, S. E.)
Piratin, P


Debbie, W.
Jenkins, R H.
Popplewell, E.


Dodds, N. N
Johnston, Douglas
Porter, E (Warrington)


Donovan, T.
Jones, D. T. (Hartlepool)
Porter, G (Leeds)


Driberg, T. E. N.
Jones,,Elwyn (Plaistow)
Price, M. Philips


Dugdale, J. (W. Bromwich)
Jones, P Asterley (Hitchin)
Proctor, W T.


Dumpleton, C. W.
Keenan, W
Pursey, Comdr. H.


Dye S.
Kenyon, C.
Randall. H. E




Ranger, J.
Snow, J. W
Weitzman, D.


Rankin, J.
Solley, L. J.
Wells, P. L (Faversham)


Rees-Williams, D. R.
Sorensen, R. W
Wells, W. T (Walsall)


Reeves, J.
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank
West, D. G.


Reid, T. (Swindon)
Sparks, J. A.
Wheatley, Rt. Hn. John (Edinb'gh, E)


Rhodes, H.
Steele, T.
White, H. (Derbyshire, N.E.)


Ridealgh, Mrs. M
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon W


Robens, A.
Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R. (Lambeth)
Wigg, George


Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvonskire)
Stress, Dr. B.
Wilkes, L.


Robertson, J. J. (Berwick)
Stubbs, A. E.
Wilkins, W. A.


Robinson, K (St. Pancras)
Summerskill, Rt Hon. Edith
Willey, F. T. (Sunderland)


Rogers, G. H R
Swingler, S
Willey, O. G. (Cleveland)


Ross, William (Kilmarnock)
Sylvester, G. O
Williams, D. J. (Neath)


Scollan, T.
Symonds, A. L.
Williams, J. L. (Kelvingrove)


Scott-Elliot, W.
Taylor, H. B. (Mansfield)
Williams, Ronald (Wigan)


Segal, Dr. S.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)
Williams, Rt. Hon. T (Don Valley)


Shackleton, E. A. A.
Taylor, Dr. S. (Barnet)
Williams, W. T. (Hammersmith, S.)


Sharp, Granville
Thomas, D. E. (Aberdare)
Williams, W. R. (Heston)


Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.
Thomas, George (Cardiff)
Willis, E.


Shurmer, P
Timmons, J.
Wills, Mrs. E. A


Silverman, J. (Erdington)
Tolley, L.
Wise, Major F. J


Silverman, S. S. (Nelson)
Tomlinson, Rt. Hon. G.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon A


Simmons, C. J
Turner-Samuels, M.
Woods, G. S.


Skeffington, A. M.
Vernon, Maj. W. F.
Yates, V. F.


Skeffington-Lodge, T. C
Walker, G. H.
Younger, Hon. Kenneth


Skinnard, F. W.
Wallace, G D. (Chislehurst)
Zilliacus, K.


Smith, C. (Colchester)
Wallace, H W. (Walthamstow, E.)



Smith, Ellis (Stoke)
Warbey, W. N.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Smith, H N. (Nottingham, S.)
Watkins, T E.
Mr. Pearson and Mr. Bowden.


Smith, S H. (Hull, S.W.)
Webb, M. (Bradford, C.)





NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Gates, Maj. E. E.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)


Amory, D. Heathcoat
George, Lady M. Lloyd (Anglesey)
Mott-Radclyffe, C. E.


Assheton, Rt Hon. R
Gomme-Duncan, Col. A.
Nicholson, G.


Astor, Hon. M.
Grimston, R. V.
Nield, B. (Chester)


Baldwin, A. E.
Gruffydd, Prof. W. J.
Noble, Comdr A. H. P


Barlow, Sir J.
Hannon, Sir P. (Moseley)
Odey, G. W.


Baxter, A. B.
Harvey, Air-Comdre, A. V.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon Sir H


Beamish, Maj. T. V. H.
Houghton, S. G.
Peake, Rt. Hon. O.


Birch, Nigel
Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Rt. Hon. Sir C
Ponsonby, Col. C. E.


Boles, Lt.-Col. D. C. (Wells)
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Poole, O. B. S. (Oswestry)


Bossom, A. C.
Hogg, Hen. Q.
Ramsay, Maj. S.


Bowen, R.
Hollis, M. C.
Reed, Sir S. (Aylesbury)


Bower, N.
Holmes, Sir J. Stanley (Harwich)
Renton, D.


Boyd-Carpenter, J. A.
Hudson, Rt. Hon. R. S. (Southport)
Roberts, Emrys (Merioneth)


Brown, W. J. (Rugby)
Hulbert, Wing-Cdr. N. J.
Roberts, W. (Cumberland, N.)


Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Hutchison, Lt.-Cdr. Clark (Edin'gh, W.)
Robertson, Sir D. (Streatham)


Bullock, Capt. M.
Hutchison, Col. J. R. (Glasgow, C.)
Robinson, Roland (Blackpool, S.)


Butcher, H. W.
Jeffreys, General Sir G.
Scott, Lord W.


Byers, Frank
Jennings, R.
Shepherd, W. S. (Bucklow)


Carson, E.
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. L. W.
Smithers, Sir W.


Chanson, H.
Keeling, E. H.
Snadden, W. M.


Clifton-Brown, Lt.-Col. G.
Kendall, W. D.
Spearman, A. C. M.


Conant, Maj. R. J. E.
Lancaster, Col. C. G.
Spence, H R.


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Langford-Holt, J.
Stoddart-Scots, Col. M


Crookshank, Capt. Rt. Hon. H F.C.
Law, Rt. Hon. R. K.
Studholme, H G


Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A H
Taylor, Vice-Adm E. A (P'dd't'n, S.)


Crowder, Capt. John E.
Lindsay, M. (Solihull)
Teeling, William


Cuthbert, W. N.
Lloyd, Maj. Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Thomas, Ivor (Keignley)


Darling, Sir W. Y.
Lloyd, Selwyn (Wirral)
Thomas, J. P L. (Hereford)


Davidson, Viscountess
Lucas-Tooth, Sir H.
Touche, G. C.


Davies, Rt Hn Clement (Montgomery)
MacAndrew, Col. Sir C.
Turton, R H.


De la Bète, R.
McCallum, Maj. D.
Vane, W. M F


Digby, Simon Wingfield
McCorquodale, Rt. Hon. M. S
Wadsworth, G.


Dodds-Parker, A. D.
MacDonald, Sir M. (Inverness)
Walker-Smith, D


Donner, P. W.
McFarlane, C. S.
Wheatley, Col. M. J. (Dorset, E.)


Dower, Col. A. V. G. (Penrith)
McKie, J. H. (Galloway)
White, Sir D. (Fareham)


Brews, C.
Maclay, Hon. J. S.
White, J. B. (Canterbury)


Dugdale, Maj. Sir (Richmond)
MacLeod, J.
Williams, Gerald (Tonbridge)


Duthie, W. S.
Macpherson, N. (Dumfries)
Willoughby de Eresby, Lord


Eccles, D. M.
Marlowe, A. A H.
York, C.


Eden, Rt Hon. A.
Marshall, D. (Bodmin)
Young, Sir A. S L (Partick)


Fraser, H. C. P. (Stone)
Medlicott, Brigadier F.



Fraser, Sir I. (Lansdale.)
Mellor, Sir J.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Fyfe, Rt. Hon. Sir D. P. M.
Molson, A H. E.
Brigadier Mackeson and


Galbraith, Cmdr. T. D. (Pollok)
Moore, Lt.-Col. Sir T.
Lieut.-Colonel Bromley-Davenport.


Galbraith, T. G. D. (Hillhead)
Morris-Jones, Sir H.



Question put, and agreed to.

Orders of the Day — CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANS

4.43 p.m.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: I beg to move,
That, in the opinion of this House, the conduct of the Chairman of Ways and Means on 5th April, 1949, in refusing to order the hon. Member for Norwich to withdraw a charge or accusation, publicly confirmed by the hon. Member, that an hon. Member of the Opposition had been guilty of a lying accusation was wanting in the impartiality required for the discharge of his office.
I should like to begin by repeating my sense of acknowledgment to the Leader of the House both for the restraint and courtesy with which he treated my Business question last Thursday and for having accorded time for the discussion of this Motion, which, I think, was well in accordance with principle, and for which I thank him. I hope that he will allow me also to thank him for the courtesy with which he received me personally. It cannot often be the case that a Private Member of the House approaches the Leader of the House as such in the ordinary working of the party system, and it was indeed a pleasant experience to do so and to find that one was received with courtesy and magnanimity, which was very much in the highest tradition of this place.
The right hon. Gentleman last Thursday invited me to take the Motion which stood in my name off the Order Paper without further discussion, and I should very much have liked to accede to that request because, if I may say so, I both understood and in some measure agreed with the ideas which I am sure animated the right hon. Gentleman in making that request. I very carefully thought the matter over, and the conclusion I came to without doubt was this: That a Motion of this kind ought neither to be put upon the Order Paper nor withdrawn from it without some public explanation to the House. I think that, whatever the dangers may be, I owe it to the House to make an explanation of this kind and that if any other course had been pursued it would have been a very dangerous and vicious precedent indeed. I must add that I do not myself feel that the withdrawal by the hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. J. Paton) of the expression which gave rise to the incident referred to in the Motion, made any difference one way or the other to that decision.
The Motion is not directed to the hon. Member for Norwich, but is directed to the conduct of the Chair, which remains unaltered whatever the decision of the hon. Member for Norwich may have been. I must add that whether hon. Members agree or disagree with the terms of the Motion which I have put down, the decision of the Chair on the occasion to which the Motion refers was a serious precedent, and I myself feel that it ought not to go forth without public protest. Therefore, on the merits of the Motion, I should have been wrong to withdraw it without making that protest.
The Motion itself charges the Chair on the occassion referred to, with a want of impartiality. I think that the House is entitled to know exactly what I mean by that phrase and what I do not mean by it. My allegation means this: that, not as a matter of error of judgment, but as a matter of deliberate choice, when what I submit was a clear.defiance of the well-established Rules of Order in this House was drawn specifically to the attention of the Chair, the Chair deliberately refused to enforce the Rules of Order but chose instead to apply some purely subjective and unascertainable criteria of its own to the Orders of the House and exercised its authority only in order to suppress those who sought to invoke the Rules of Order and not as a means of ordering those who had broken the Rules of Order to abide by them for the future or to withdraw their breach. That, so far as I can see it, is a want of impartiality.
It will be noted that I make no allegation in the Motion of party bias. I wish expressly to say here and now that that omission from the Motion was not unintentional. I meant to imply nothing of the kind, but I think that in a Motion of this sort everything one means should be said plainly and that there should be nothing whatever by way of innuendo or insinuation underlying it. Not only had I no intention of making an allegation of that sort, but I do not wish anyone to be under any misapprehension that any such intention was in my mind. The right of substantive Motion has, I think, been well-established for many years in cases of this kind. So far as I can ascertain, it was exercised as recently as a few years ago by Mr. Wedgwood Benn, as he then was, when he brought no fewer than 27 Members


into the Lobby against the Speaker of his day. On the whole, I think that it is well that from time to time it should be established that substantive Motions of this kind can be put down by Private Members who have questions of principle which they seek to apply.
My charge, therefore, is this: that there was a deliberate refusal by the Chair to apply well-ascertained Rules of Order when an open breach of them had been established and specifically brought to its notice, and that the Chair used its authority for the purpose of suppressing those who had invoked them, and not for the purpose of enforcing the Rules. The existence of such a duty on the Chair has been established from the very earliest times. This is not a question of discretion; it is a question of duty, and that duty is laid down—I do not wish to quote the words because the passage is a little long—in page 438 of the current edition of Erskine May. Side by side with that duty there has been established the right of a Member to draw the attention of the Chair to breaches of Order, once well established, in order that the Chair may perform its duty, and perform it directly.
As regards unparliamentary expressions and personal allusions, I also submit that the Rules of this House are very well known and established beyond doubt. I wish to read one sentence from page 431 of Erskine May—a sentence which I think we all need to take to heart, not least myself—and then to come to certain examples. The sentence I wish to read is this:
Good temper and moderation are the characteristics of parliamentary language. Parliamentary language is never more desirable than when a Member is canvassing the opinions and conduct of his opponents in debate.
The learned editor of Erskine May then goes on to give examples of what he calls "expressions which are unparliamentary and call for prompt interference"—that is by the Chair. The examples he gives include the following:
1. The imputation of false or unavowed motives.
I do not think I need read 2.
3. Charges of uttering a deliberate falsehood.
Then it goes on to cite a number of precedents of that. I have read every one of the precedents under the head of charges of making a deliberate falsehood

cited by Erskine May at that point—every one, that is, since 1867—and I have also read two which have taken place since that edition of Erskine May was published. I think I am correctly summarising them when I say that, whatever particular form of words is used, once it has become unmistakably plain that one Member is insinuating of another or saying of another in open terms, that he said that which he knew to be false, either in the House or outside it, then the Chair must and should intervene at once to direct the offender to withdraw—and that without any particular form of words.
But the precedents establish, I think, something more than that. They establish that there are certain words in the English language which so plainly or so usually carry with them that imputation that, whatever may have been the inner meaning of the person speaking, the Chair should intervene to direct the person using them to withdraw those words whenever they are applied to another Member of this House. The Chair has even gone so far in two instances as to apply that Rule to the word "falsehood" unaccompanied by any descriptive epithet, and I should have thought, and I believed it to be true, a fortiori, that the word "lie" or "liar," or the verbs and adjectives compounded of or derived from it, have always been so regarded, and that whenever that word, or any part of it, has ever been used by a Member of this House and the Chair has had its attention drawn to it, the Chair has always insisted upon the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of the expression.
There are only two qualifications, I think, to be made about that Rule. You, Mr. Speaker—certainly in the speech which you made when you were inaugurated at the beginning of this Parliament, and I remember on one other occasion in a very happy speech—have referred more than once to the possibility of the Chair being what I might describe as judicially deaf; that is to say; not hearing as Mr. Speaker things which actually fall with an impact upon your human ears. I hope to persuade the House that certainly this is not a case where there can be any such pretence. Secondly, I think it is true to say that the Chair will very often put a charitable construction on words when they are capable of two alternative con-


structions. But where the words are plain the Chair will not quibble; where the words in their ordinary and actual meaning convey an offensive imputation, then the Chair will direct the offender to withdraw.
I must say this, too, in all sincerity. These Rules are not meant for the protection of the reputations of hon. Members; they are not meant to prevent things being said which we do not want said in public; they bear no relation to whether the things that are said are true or false, or whether the charges are justified or unjustified. These Rules are meant to keep order, and the disregard of these Rules, and particularly the refusal by the Chair to enforce them, leads, as surely as the tides follow the moon, to the outbreak of disorder. That is absolutely certain. I must also add this, because I think it only right to do so. These Rules were worked out by our forebears in days when House of Commons life was much rougher than it is now. I hope I shall be forgiven if I say that this has been a very well behaved Parliament on both sides. I think it is due to us to say that it has been well behaved compared with Parliaments of the past, all of them I think, and it may prove to be very well behaved compared with Parliaments of the future.

Mr. Ellis Smith: I am sure the hon. Gentleman is anxious to tell us the whole facts in stating his case. Does he think that the behaviour which led up to the remark in question being made was consistent with the case he is now making out? Does he not agree that some very provocative remarks were made prior to the making of the statement of which he speaks?

Mr. Hogg: I want to be perfectly fair, but I am equally anxious to couch my remarks in a wholly unprovocative way. Although, of course, there are things I shall say with which hon. Members will not agree, I want to say them in such a manner that hon. Members will not feel in any way offended when I do say them. Perhaps it would be better if the hon. Gentleman would allow me to deal with these matters with which I propose to deal in the way in which I had planned.
That brings me very clearly to the incident, or series of events leading up to the incident to which the Motion refers.

It began in the latter part of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Food, at the point at which he had been criticising the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Sir D. Robertson). I have looked at the precedents and I do not think I should be in Order in discussing in any way matters other than those which are strictly relevant to this Motion; indeed, I think I should be unwise to do so, even if I were in Order.
The point arose in the course of the Minister's speech at which he desired to say, and did say, that the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham was inspired by hatred of the Government and not by motives of patriotism. I feel myself that that might have been considered an imputation of an unavowed motive, but I make no complaint about the fact that the Chair did not intervene at that stage. The right hon. Gentleman went on to say that this was only an example of Members of my party allowing their hatred of the Government to overcome their patriotism. Again, that is something upon which I do not think I need comment on this Motion; I simply narrate it as an event which led up to the incident upon which I am not only entitled but bound to comment. The effect of that was that my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Mr. M. Lindsay)—I read from HANSARD, which, in parenthesis, may I say, has an almost miraculously accurate account of what took place in a matter of a few minutes or seconds; one would scarcely have thought it possible for shorthand writers to be quite as skilful as these have been—said:
On a point of Order. Is it in Order for an ex-member of the Fascist Party to cast aspersions on"—
Then comes "interruption" in brackets. I do not wish to comment on that remark. It was withdrawn, and in my opinion it was rightly withdrawn by my hon. Friend who made it. It certainly was not a remark I should have made, because my state of knowledge about the right hon. Gentleman is greater than my hon. Friend's. It is not a remark I should have made about him in any circumstances. However, that remark was made, and I reserve the only comment I want to make about it.
That in its turn led the hon. Member for Norwich to rise immediately, except


for one absolutely irrelevant observation from the Chair. The hon. Member for Norwich said this:
On a point of Order. Is it in Order for hon. Members of the Opposition to make a lying accusation against my right hon. Friend?
Those were the words he used and which he has subsequently withdrawn, and in my opinion has quite properly withdrawn. I draw the attention of the House firstly to the point that he did not say it, as it were, in heat. He rose and obtained a lull for himself by saying "On a point of Order," thereby making it quite certain that what he said should be heard clearly, and it was heard clearly.
The Chairman then replied with this observation, and this is the first note of direct criticism I want to strike. Having said,
We can only have one point of Order at a time,
the Chairman's reply to the hon. Member for Norwich was:
I am not in a position to say whether the accusation was a lying accusation or not.
That means that the Chair had heard the words clearly uttered, as everyone in the House heard them, thereby debarring him from alleging official deafness, and secondly that he understood them in exactly the same sense as any Member in the House understood them, as meaning that my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull was deliberately saying what was not true about the Minister of Food. At any rate, that was understood by the Chair, and it was understood by every Member of the House.
In my respectful submission, the words are incapable, subject to any legal quibbles any ingenious man may think of, of having any other construction whatsoever. I raised this point of Order therefore, and said, as I have said on other occasions when I have heard that word used:
On a point of Order. I distinctly heard the hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. J. Paton) insinuate that something was a lying accusation. Do you, Major Milner, think that the word 'lying' should be used towards Members of the Opposition? I would ask you to ask him to repeat those words in order that they may be taken down, and I would ask you to ask him to withdraw the words 'lying accusation.' Can we not have the protection of the Chair?

The Chairman then said:
If one Member accuses another of telling a lie or being a liar it would be proper for me to ask him to withdraw. I did not gather that that was the imputation in this case. I do not, therefore, propose to ask the hon. Member to withdraw.
I submit from the facts as I have stated them, firstly, that it was absolutely plain that the Chairman heard exactly what the hon. Member had said, and secondly that the hon. Member had used an expression to my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull, clearly coming within the repeated Rulings of the Chair that that word and all compounds of it are out of Order, and that the Chairman had clearly understood the sense in which it was used. Instead of directing the hon. Member for Norwich to withdraw, the Chairman replied, firstly, by what I can only describe as a feeble joke, and, secondly, as a matter of arbitrary decision, that he did not propose to order him to withdraw. That is not impartial conduct on the part of the Chair; at any rate that is what I submit in these matters.

Mr. Driberg: Is it not clear to the hon. Member that the Chair might possibly have observed, as the hon. Member has just read out, that the hon. Member for Norwich used the plural and was not referring to one specific Member of the Opposition?

Mr. Hogg: It did occur to me, and the hon. Member has evidently not been paying attention to the HANSARD record which shows, although the plural was used originally by the hon. Member for Norwich, the Chairman's reply was:
I am not in a position to say whether the accusation was a lying accusation or not.
The Chairman deliberately used the singular quite clearly, showing that the lying accusation was in respect of the accusation by my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull. To do the hon. Member for Norwich credit, he has never denied that at any stage, because he is a man of honour. That is what he sought to impute. I raised therefore a second point of order, and said:
Further to that point of Order, Major Milner. I distinctly heard the hon. Member for Norwich use the words lying accusation.' I believe I am in Order is asking him in your presence to confirm or deny what I have asserted.
In doing that I was not simply repeating myself, but was following your express directions, Mr. Speaker, made on 14th


March, 1945, when you expressly laid down that that was the true course to follow if there was any question of the Chair having not caught the proper imputation of the words. In spite of your express Ruling as recently as March, 1945, the Chairman refused to do that, and in fact said:
If the hon. Member for Norwich did make any accusation that a Member of this House, whether on one side or the other, was telling a lie or was a liar, then, of course, he should withdraw. If that was not the case, perhaps the hon. Member will indicate so to me.
The hon. Member for Norwich was perfectly candid about it. He never concealed the words he used, or the intention he intended to convey. Any ingenious interpretation that others have sought to put on them is wholly foreign to the honest nature of the hon. Member for Norwich, whose only part in these proceedings after this episode was in a manly fashion to withdraw what he said. He said:
With the greatest respect to the Chair, Major Milner, I made my observation after a wholly false accusation that a Minister of the Crown was a Fascist had been made from the other side.
If there had been up to that point any doubt whatsoever, as there seems to be in the mind of the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg), as to what the hon. Member for Norwich meant, or the particular accusation made by my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull, that doubt is removed by that intervention.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: Will the hon. Member give way?

Mr. Hogg: On the whole, I would rather not. I think it is important that this Debate should not degenerate into recriminations. The House will give me credit, I think, for trying to put my point of view in a wholly unprovocative way. I am afraid that if I constantly gave way I should be drawn into a Debate which the House would probably regret. The hon. Member's questions are not always as simple as he claims, and they are not always questions. The Chairman then said:
Order. We cannot continue on these lines"—
the only observation he made with which I agreed;
Having regard to what the hon. Member for Norwich has said, I do not propose to direct him to withdraw.

I rose to make my third appeal to the Chairman, in an attempt to ask him whether he could not, in the circumstances, order the words to be taken down in accordance with Section 160 of the Manual of Procedure. At that stage, the Chairman said:
…I must decline to hear the hon. Member for Oxford again."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 5th April, 1949; Vol. 463, c. 1993–5.]
It is no part of my case to harp upon any feeling of resentment I may have felt personally at that time. I only say this to the Chairman now: he has, like myself, been trained in the study of the law, and he must know how far down in the judicial scale one must sink before one deliberately refuses to listen to a person who is seeking to invoke the protection of authority to enforce the Rules of Order which it is their duty to enforce.
Therein lies the charge I make. I deliberately say that if the Chairman, in answer to the point of Order raised by the hon. Member for Norwich had only said, "It is not in Order to call a Member a Fascist, and it is not in Order to accuse an hon. Member of a lying accusation, and both hon. Members will withdraw," I believe that both hon. Members would have done so, and that the conclusion of that Debate would not have been one which most of us, for whatever reasons, now regard with feelings of regret. I believe that the refusal by the Chair to enforce the Rules of Order always leads to disorder, and I believe that the responsibility for the disorder on that occasion rests with the conduct of the Chair. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] That is why I have put down this Motion.
I wish to say three things in conclusion. First, if this had been an isolated decision I should not have adverted to it, but it is not an isolated decision. On the contrary, I believe that for over a period of months there has been a tendency—

Mr. Logan: On a point of Order. The hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) has raised the case of what was said on 5th April. Has he any right, Mr. Speaker, to bring any other matter forward for consideration now?

Mr. Speaker: I was listening carefully. I do not think the hon. Member ought to go too wide.

Mr. Hogg: I did not mean to, Sir, but I think I am entitled to say—and I do


not think that the hon. Member for the Scotland Division of Liverpool (Mr. Logan) is being as helpful as I know he intends to be—that over a period of months now—

Mr. S. Silverman: On a point of Order, I think it is a well-recognised rule, Mr. Speaker, that no innuendo or attack whatever on the conduct of the Chair can be made except by a substantive Motion placed on the Order Paper. There is a substantive Motion on the Order Paper relating to an incident in which the conduct of the Chair is impugned. If there is any imputation on the conduct of the Chair other than that referred to in the Motion, I submit that that is wholly out of Order.

Mr. Speaker: I quite agree, and I gave a warning that the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) should not go very far into this matter.

Mr. Hogg: I am certainly taking note of that warning, Mr. Speaker. I was not raising any case—[HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."]—other than the construction which I deliberately place on this incident. It is this: that the Chair, instead of enforcing the Rules of Order, which are perfectly plain and applicable to this case, deliberately chose as a matter of policy to substitute for those Rules of Order in this case a private and unascertainable criterion of its own in place of those ascertained Rules of Order. That is what I meant, and I deliberately accuse the Chair of a want of impartiality on this occasion.
I will say no more about the Chair on this matter except this. My own view—and I wonder whether the House agrees or disagrees—is that this House will take from the Chair almost any degree of exercise of authority. It is not afraid of a strong Chairman; indeed, it loves a strong Chairman; but it will tolerate that only in so far as authority is used to enforce the objective criteria imposed by the Rules of this House. But when the rebuke, the decision, the authority, is replaced by the subjective criterion of the feeble joke or the sneer, then I submit that the House is going down the slippery slope.
In putting down this Motion I want the right hon. and gallant Gentleman whom I have criticised in plain terms to

believe that I was not actuated by any feelings of personal malice or spite. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] On the contrary, my feeling of conscience on this matter has been absolutely imperative. I believe I could have obtained many signatures to this Motion had I tried, but I have deliberately not tried to get any, or to enlist support from this side of the House or from anywhere else. I felt it my duty, as a servant of the public in this House, to make a solemn protest about what I regarded as a deliberate and vicious precedent.
I have discharged my duty and I am, therefore, free to say that I do not desire to embitter things further by pushing this Motion to a Division. It would be a tragedy, in a matter of this kind, to do more than make the solemn protest I have made. The Motion had to go on the Order Paper so that I could do what I conceived to be my duty. I withdraw nothing, either from the Motion on the Order Paper or from what I have said.

Mr. Driberg: Mr. Driberg rose—

Mr. Hogg: I earnestly say to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman that I sincerely wish him well in the conduct of the Chair. I desire to do nothing which may cause future bitterness. This matter is one for the House to decide as to the proper course to take. I apprehend that the Prime Minister may have something to say on this Motion, and I therefore propose to give way, without more ado, to enable the right hon. Gentleman to give such advice as he may think suitable.

Mr. Speaker: The Motion must be seconded before it can be put to the House.

Mr. Hogg: I was proposing to give way to the Prime Minister.

Mr. Speaker: We cannot have an irregular Debate. Does any hon. Member second the Motion?

Mr. Hogg: I think the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg) had a question which he wished to put to me. I think he rose, and I would have given way. I shall answer him if I am allowed to do so.

Major Legge-Bourke: I beg to second the Motion.

5.20 p.m.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): The conduct of the Chair in this House is supported by a great and honourable tradition and one has always to take the greatest care before one makes any aspersions on the conduct of the Chair and particularly a charge of partiality. I listened to the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) with great care and his charge really came not to a charge of lack of impartiality but a mistake of judgment. The hon. Gentleman has been conducting this post mortem in the calm of this afternoon, but we have to look at what the Chair did in a very different atmosphere at the end of a hot Debate, with a crowded House, and with a great deal of noise and with accusations being flung across the Floor.
It is a fact that at times like this a Member who wants to get in above noise very often uses the words "On a point of Order." It is quite often not a point of Order at all, and if the Chair took strictly every single point of Order it would play not into the hands of the Debate but perhaps into those of obstructionists. I was present on this occasion. I came in when the House was already a little noisy. It was getting still noisier. There was shouting across the Floor and a number of Members shouted out the word "Mosleyite," which was objected to. A more specific statement on a point of Order was made by the hon. Member for Solihull (Mr. M. Lindsay). There was subsequently a statement made by the hon. Member for Norwich (Mr. J. Paton). I do not think it was so absolutely clear as the hon. Member for Oxford says. It would take a great deal of argument to show exactly the reaction of the House to those particular words "lying accusation." It is a question of whether it was an accusation against a particular Member or a number of Members. That makes a difference.
I am not proposing to argue the case one way or the other, except to say that the hon. Gentleman is very clear on it. He has had a long time to study authorities, but it is another matter when one of these things is thrown to the Chair when there is great heat in Debate. The Chairman has to make up his mind. The suggestion is that in every case the Chairman's duty is simple and that he has to take a certain action. However, I do not

think it is always quite that. The position of one occupying the Chair in this House is something like a referee in a football match. He often has to interpret the rules a bit in order to see that the play goes on in the best possible way. In my experience of the House I have seen Debates conducted where the Debate would have been brought entirely to a futile end if there had not been, as we say sometimes, a certain deafness or a certain action on the part of the Chair.
My point is that if we judge this from the position of the Chairman, we know that he has to act in a heated House when there are a great number of accusations flying about one way or another. Therefore, I do not think it is fair in a case of this kind to charge the Chairman with partiality. He might presumably have called to Order the hon. Member for Solihull. He did not do that. There might have been a great deal going on in the House and he let the thing go on. In difficult circumstances, the Chairman was trying to do his best to get that Debate through in an orderly way.
It is a pity to put a Motion of this kind on the Order Paper and to hold a post mortem and dissect the whole thing with precedents afterwards. If there is an accusation against anyone in the Chair for acting from improper motives that is one thing. I do not think the hon. Member for Oxford intended that. What it boils down to is that he has suggested that there had been a lack of judgment. Everybody who has been in the chair at a meeting has been conscious at some time or another of the difficulty of coming to a right decision. I have seen wrong ones and right ones.
While we must insist on the Rules of Order, there is a danger of being over sensitive in this House. As a matter of fact, there has been over a period of years, I am told on the good authority of old Members, a considerable softening of manners in this House. When I read some of the Debates in the past I am surprised at what people got away with. That softening of manners in a good thing, but we must not be too meticulous. The Chair has a right always to see that it does not interrupt the actual Debate but keeps the effect of the Debate going. The occupant of the Chair has to exercise his judgment. I am sure that that is what


the right hon. and gallant Gentleman did on this occasion under very difficult circumstances.

5.26 p.m.

Mr. Proctor: We have listened to the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) and we have heard of his investigations. It would have been proper on his part if, when he came to the portion of Erskine May where it referred to good temper and moderation, he had closed the book and left the incident at that, because I am going to submit, as one who sat through the whole of the Debate, that it was want of good temper and moderation on the part of the hon. Member for Oxford that led to many difficulties that happened that evening. I believe the Chair acted impartially and quite properly. It is well within the discretion of the Chair to interpret the whole of the matters in the manner in which the right hon. and gallant Gentleman did that evening.
The second point I wish to make is that no one can be sure that the report in HANSARD is exactly what happened on that occasion. I myself have a little experience of writing shorthand, and I know the facility with which a circle can be left out to turn a plural into a singular. It is not at all certain that every syllable and every word of what took place is actually contained in HANSARD. In the first case the hon. Member for Solihull (Mr. M. Lindsay) intervened on a point of Order with a question to the Chair, which was:
Is it in Order for an ex-member of the Fascist Party to cast aspersions on
The Chairman treated that question by saying that it was not a point of Order. I see nothing improper in that. I would remind the House that today we had a similar question put to the Chair, when Mr. Speaker was asked,
Is it in Order to refer to this incident as a foul and bloody murder?
Mr. Speaker's answer to that was:
It is not in Order.
I submit that the cases and the decisions are similar. In both cases they were absolutely proper.

Major Legge-Bourke: I am sure the hon. Gentleman wants to be as accurate as he can.

Mr. Proctor: I want to be absolutely accurate.

Major Legge-Bourke: What Mr. Speaker said this afternoon was
I should think probably not.

Mr. Proctor: I should think probably there is so little difference in that, that it is not worth bothering about.
The next point I want to refer to is the point of Order made by hon. Friend the Member for Norwich (Mr. Paton). He said:
On a point of Order. Is it in Order for hon. Members of the Opposition to make a lying accusation against my right hon. Friend?
The answer to that was:
I am not in a position to say whether the accusation was a lying accusation or not."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 5th April, 1949; Vol 463, c. 1993–4.]
That might easily mean that the Chair did not hear any of the things which were being referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich. In the first place, it is a reference to a number of accusations and not to a single accusation at all. I say that the Chair on that occasion dealt with the matter in a perfectly impartial way and is deserving of the full support of this House.

5.31 p.m.

Sir Ian Fraser: I much regret that my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) has put down this Motion, the operative words of which are "wanting in impartiality." I do not think that to ordinary, plain people that can mean anything but a suggestion that the Chair was either seeking to be, or was in fact being, partial. I heard the whole of that affair and I thought that the occupant of the Chair was trying to be fair to both sides. I thought he was seeking to further the progress of the business of the Committee. I therefore regret this Motion and I ask my hon. Friend to withdraw it.

5.32 p.m.

Mr. Driberg: I wish to make only two very brief points. For the first, I will revert to my interruption of the speech of the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg), which I am sure he misunderstood. It was not the word "accusation" which I suggested should be plural, but the word "Members."


The point at issue is that my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich (Mr. Paton) made a general accusation against a number of hon. Gentlemen opposite. This may sound a small, trivial point, but it is not so trivial as it sounds on first hearing, for the reason that although it is out of Order to make imputations against, or to accuse of lying, a specific hon. Member of this House, the custom has been that it is not strictly out of Order, however undesirable it may be, to make imputations against groups of Members. This is the point I wanted to make and which the hon. Member for Oxford misunderstood when I interrupted him.
I say not only that the Chair was not guilty of the partiality of which he has been accused. Let us make no mistake about it; the hon. Member for Oxford was not accusing the Chair of error of judgment or of anything like that. His speech rubbed it in and made it clear that he was accusing the Chair of a deliberate policy of partiality. I say that not only was the Chair not guilty of that charge but that he was not even guilty of an error of judgment. I suggest that it would be most unfair to the Chair that this Motion should be withdrawn, that there should be no Division and that he should be left under this very grave imputation. I hope that the hon. Member for Oxford will not withdraw the Motion, and that if he seeks to do so the House will refuse him permission, so that there may be an overwhelming majority of hon. Members from both sides of this House in the Lobby to defeat it.

5.35 p.m.

Mr. Clement Davies: I intervene for just a few moments to speak in support of what has just been said by the hon. Member for Maldon (Mr. Driberg). No more serious charge can be brought against you, Sir, or the Chairman of Ways and Means as Deputy-Speaker, than an accusation of want of impartiality. Such a charge ought never to be brought unless it can be supported by the clearest possible evidence. Like all hon. Members I have read through the HANSARD report. I fail to see a single instance there where a charge of partiality can be brought against the Chair. In my view, which I think is the view of all

hon. Members of this House, this Motion ought not to have been put on the Paper at all. Still worse, the hon. Member for Oxford has not only made the charge that on that occasion the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was guilty of partiality, but that his behaviour was a culmination of a whole series of incidents. If the hon. Member intended to mean that, he ought to have included it in the Motion.
I deeply regret that this Motion remained on the Paper for so long. No charge ought to be made against you or either of your two deputies unless it is debated immediately. You are here to protect the interests of individual Members and to see that the business of the House is conducted properly. In addition, there is a duty upon us, which is that you and your deputies are entitled to the full protection of the House on all these occasions.

5.37 p.m.

Mr. Sydney Silverman: I desire to detain the House for not more than two or three minutes. There is no doubt that the proceedings that night had become a little heated. There was a good deal of temper on all sides and I am sure that a good many things were said that were afterwards regretted. That is why it is such a great pity that the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) should be the only Member of this House who allowed his bad temper to survive the occasion. Everybody else next morning had forgotten it, but not the hon. Member. He had to put his Motion upon the Paper. Not merely that, but after several days he thought it fair to make the kind of speech that he made this afternoon, and then not even to move his Motion at all until he was compelled to do so from this side of the House.
I cannot imagine how any Member of the House could possibly act more unfairly than to make the kind of speech that the hon. Member made, then first to seek not to move his Motion at all so that he could never be answered, and then after it is moved to seek to withdraw it so that it could never be defeated. It shows quite clearly how ill-advised the hon. Member was, when we think of the kind of accusation that he made. In the end, he said, at one point the position went beyond doubt. The point that he chose, in order to illustrate that his


charge was proved beyond doubt, was that my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich (Mr. Paton) said that something was a wholly false accusation. I submit that there is nothing either unparliamentary or out of Order in saying that an accusation is false if it is false. It may be out of Order to say that it is a lie but it is not out of Order to say that it is false. The particular accusation that was made that night was not only admittedly false, but the hon. Member who made it withdrew it later that night and accepted an assurance that it was false. Therefore the point which the hon. Member for Oxford uses in order to prove his case, seems to me to disprove it beyond further argument. I hope that the House will retain possession of this Motion, not allow it to be withdrawn, and defeat it unanimously.

5.40 p.m.

Mr. W. J. Brown: I was not present on the occasion of the Debate which gave rise to the contretemps which has been discussed today, but I have read the pages of HANSARD, and the view that I formed is that although there was in my opinion an error of judgment on the part of the Chair, there was nothing that occurred then or has occurred since which justifies the imputation of want of impartiality on the part of the Chair. All of us are capable of making mistakes, and in the Chair at a time of high dispute and sometimes high temper a Chairman who was never wrong would be something more than human; but that is not the issue here. The charge is not that an error of judgment was made; the charge is of a want of impartiality on the part of the Chair, and that is the issue with which we have to deal.
The second point I want to make is that this is not an accusation made in the heat of the moment. In the same way as all of us can make mistakes in the heat of the moment, all of us can make wrong imputations in the heat of the moment, but this is not so made. It is made subsequently, and it is persisted in after the opportunity of a graceful withdrawal has been provided. That seems to me to be a fact of some importance. The Lord President of the Council invites the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) to come into discussion, and though I was not present, I can pretty well guess that the Lord President would

have urged the hon. Member for Oxford not to persist in this Motion. However, he persists in it, and it my view that as he has persisted in it, a vote must be taken upon the Motion.
There must be a vote because otherwise things would be intolerable in this House. Every one of us has a right to put down a Motion attacking the Chair, and if we feel that the Chair has been wrong, that is not only our right; it may conceivably be our duty. I remember the right hon. Gentleman the late Member for Caernarvon Boroughs putting down on the Order Paper a straight Motion of censure on the Speaker. We all have that right, but the one thing we must do if we exercise it is to come to the House, state our case for attacking the lack of impartiality of the Chair and stand by the decision of the House of Commons. That is the situation with which we are faced. Withdrawal before today would have been possible and proper; withdrawal today would be quite improper and we ought to make it impossible. Therefore, in agreement with other colleagues, I suggest that we should retain this Motion on the Paper and insist upon a vote on it.

5.43 p.m.

The Lord President of the Council (Mr. Herbert Morrison): We have now had a fair Debate on this matter. It is perhaps a pity that it was not handled with greater brevity in the opening speech of the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) because there is some feeling, I gather, among my hon. Friends that the House ought to come to a decision. I am not resisting the idea that the House should come to a decision. I think that in all the circumstances, having got as far as we have, we had better come to a decision; but there are two ways of coming to a decision. One' is to try to get a Division somehow so that there is a majority and a minority, and the other is, if the House is virtually unanimous, to decide about it by the question being put and by its being negatived without a Division.
If I may say so, the course of the Motion being negatived without a Division would be the best way because even if a limited number of Members voted, it is not nice for the Chair and we want to keep the Chair in good relationship with the House. Therefore, my advice to the hon. Member for Oxford would


be to take the course whereby the Motion can be negatived, and my advice to the House as a whole would be that there is no point in taking a Division merely for the sake of having one, if the House can virtually decide unanimously that the Motion should not be carried. I hope that the course I have suggested will commend itself now to the House.

5.45 p.m.

Mr. Eden: I want to associate myself with what the Leader of the House has said. In these matters we have to think not only of the present but even beyond the present, and it would be most unhappy to have a Division if the House can take its decision without a vote and having a minority on an issue which affects the authority of the Chair. I feel sure that for the future guardianship of this House that will be the right course to take. I hope that it is a course which my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) will be able to take.

5.46 p.m.

Mr. Hogg: I certainly propose to accept the advice given from the two Front Benches. I think I have the right to say this, and I propose to say it if I have the right. One point which the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) made was a good one, but as a matter of fact it was unjust. He said that this Motion had remained on the Order Paper too long. I agree with him, but the Leader of the House will agree with me that there were circumstances beyond my control and beyond his control which caused the delay which were not my fault at any rate. I should have preferred to have it dealt with at a much earlier date, but I think it was thought that it would be convenient that the Leader of the House should be present at this discussion, and certainly I fell in with that decision, which I think was right.
It is also quite unfair and wrong to say, as did the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), that I sought not to move the Motion. I sought to give way to the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister who, I apprehended, had something to say. It was not in

order—as I thought the hon. Member rather wrongly suggested—to avoid any further discussion that I gave way to him; I thought it might be too late for him to say that which I thought he had it in his mind to say if I did not formally give way. I have not sought in any way to run away from the things I have put down.
It has been put by the Prime Minister that this was a heated Debate, and I certainly take that fully into account. I have also taken into account the other things which the Lord President said. My own view is exactly that put forward by the Leader of the House. I had to put this Motion on the Order Paper in order to make what I regarded as a protest which it was my duty to make, and now, having made it, I am quite free and quite willing to see it negatived in the way the right hon. Gentleman suggested.

Question put, and negatived.

HOUSING (SCOTLAND) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

5.49 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. J. J. Robertson): I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."
This is the first occasion I have had to speak from the Government Front Bench on a Measure of major importance to Scotland, and I feel sure that many right hon. and hon. Members, particularly those who have served a period in local government, will be able to appreciate and, I hope, share my feelings of pleasure in rising to move the Second Reading of this important Bill. Certainly no one who has been a member of a Scottish local authority at any time during the past 30 years can have failed to realise the vitally important part which housing plays in the lives of our people.
Prior to being elected to Parliament I had the useful experience of representing a working-class area for about nine years on the Council of the City of Edinburgh. The shocking housing conditions prevailing in that predominantly working-class ward had its reflection in the high infantile mortality rate of 112 deaths per thousand children born in that dockland area of the capital of Scotland. I cannot


easily forget the courageous and often heartbreaking daily struggle of decent working-class people to cope with the difficulties of rearing their families to become good citizens in these dreary, dark vennels of the slums of the Scottish cities and towns. Nor do I forget that the health, working efficiency, habits and social conduct of a community have their roots in family life.
It is against this background of personal experience and intimate knowledge of just how much a good home means to the wellbeing and happiness of a working-class family, particularly the housewife—I emphasise the housewife—that I have found so much interest in the furtherance of Scottish housing during the last 18 months when my right hon. Friend has asked me to devote my main activity to speeding up the Scottish housing programme. While that work continues, I feel some satisfaction in the introduction of this far-reaching piece of legislation. The considerable progress made during the past year, and the gratifying figures of the first three months of this year, for the completion of permanent houses, leads us to the conclusion that the time is now ripe for the introduction of this important Bill.
The Bill is important because it makes certain fundamental changes in the Scottish Housing Acts. Scotland is now in an era of industrial expansion. The population is, to some extent, on the move. Housing accommodation is needed in new places and for different classes. We must, therefore, have a comprehensive and flexible housing policy. This involves the removal of certain restrictions and the filling of certain gaps in Scottish housing legislation. There are, in addition, other social and economic considerations to be taken into account. Scotland has a heritage of solidly built stone houses which are worth conserving as a national asset. The improvement of these houses would give tolerable living conditions to thousands of our people at present indifferently housed.
The Bill accordingly seeks to do four things: first, to extend the powers of local authorities to deal with the housing not merely of the working classes but of all classes and of all members of the community; secondly, to make financial assistance available for the improvement of existing houses thirdly, to provide certain new special subsidies for other

housing purposes, and finally, to make certain amendments to the Scottish Housing Acts so that they will form a more comprehensive and flexible instrument of housing policy.
I should like to say something about the background of Part I. For nearly 100 years the powers and duties of local authorities have been restricted to dealing with the housing conditions of what were termed the working classes. The first Housing Act was called the Dwelling Houses (Scotland) Act, 1855, and was an Act to facilitate the erection of dwelling houses of the working classes in Scotland. Since then the powers and duties of local authorities have been progressively widened, but their powers and duties continued to relate to working class housing.
In 1919, after the famous Royal Commission Report of 1917, a definite statutory obligation was placed upon local authorities to provide housing accommodation required for the working classes in their districts. These new powers and duties were supplemented by financial incentives. The 1919 Act started a system of housing subsidies from the Exchequer and the rates. The 1919 and the 1923 Acts together produced 76,000 houses in Scotland, but the biggest single contribution between the two wars was made by the 1924 and the 1930 Acts passed by Labour Governments. The 1924 Act—which became known throughout Scotland as the Wheatley Act—and the 1930 Act together produced 133,000 houses in Scotland, 125,000 of them by local authorities. In other words, one half of all the houses produced by local authorities in Scotland between 1919 and 1939 resulted from former Labour Government Acts.

Sir William Darling: What was the subsidy?

Mr. Robertson: The subsidy was so generous in the case of the Wheatley Act that succeeding Conservative Governments took the Act from the Statute Book.

Mr. Willis: And stopped housing.

Mr. Robertson: Part I of the Bill makes a definite break with the past. It places a duty on local authorities to have regard to the housing needs of all members of the community. It does this by


wiping out the restrictive reference to the working classes in all the Scottish Housing Acts. This recognises an evolutionary process at work in our society during the last generation. The common dangers of the two wars, especially of the last war, and the advent of a Labour Government have broken down a multitude of artificial distinctions between different social classes and between different income groups. Many class barriers have gone and, where they have not already gone, I can see them disappearing. I feel, therefore, that I need offer no apology for asking the House to bring the Scottish Housing Acts abreast of the times. There are positive reasons for this change which we are proposing. Here, for example, is what the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee said in 1944—

Commander Galbraith: To which report is the hon. Gentleman referring?

Mr. Robertson: The Report on the Distribution of Houses. I quote from the report:
A local community must essentially be well-balanced. It is not a well-balanced community if it is confined to one income group or to one trade or calling, or does not include enough people to form groups covering a variety of social and intellectual interests. Life in a varied community can stimulate that tolerance and mutual respect which are essential in the world today.
I want, however, to add a word of caution. Part I of the Bill does not mean that local authorities are going to build large numbers of bigger houses for the middle classes at high rents. It does not mean that we are forgetting that Scotland has still far too many unfit and overcrowded houses. Apart from the deletion of the expression "working class," the statutory duty to deal with the slums and overcrowding remains unaltered. What it does mean is that in future authorities will look at the local circumstances of each particular scheme, and if a sufficiently balanced community does not already exist in the neighbourhood, they will be encouraged to consider what steps they should take to provide for the growth of such a community.
I come now to Part II of the Bill which provides for financial assistance for the improvement of existing houses. Many committees have made recom-

mendations on the improvement of the older stone houses in Scotland, but the most important step, perhaps, was taken in 1944, when Mr. Tom Johnston, the then Secretary of State, asked the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee to report on the matter. The Committee set up a sub-committee under the chairmanship of the late Mr. Archibald McTaggart to make inquiries. The Committee's Report was published in 1947 under the title "Modernising Our Homes" and contains a detailed survey of what can be done—and what must be done—to deal with this peculiarly Scottish problem. The Report points out that Scotland has about 900,000 houses which were built before 1919. Of these 900,000 houses, about 400,000—or nearly one-third of all the houses in Scotland—have w.c.s that are used in common by two, three, four or five families. Of these houses nearly 300,000 are situated in the cities and burghs.

Commander Galbraith: I am sorry to interrupt, but I should like to get the picture clear. The hon. Gentleman is referring to the figure in the Report. That refers, does it not, to the 1931 census? So that we shall not confuse the position today with that in 1931, can the hon. Gentleman say whether that is the 1931 or 1944 figure, or whenever it was that the Report was made?

Mr. Robertson: I am referring to the pre-1919 houses. The Report was published in 1947.
As I was saying, a large proportion of these houses have w.c.s used in common by two, three, four and five families. Of these houses nearly 300,000 are situated in the cities and burghs. Large numbers of these houses are without baths, without separate kitchens, and without modern cooking and heating appliances. While some of these defective houses were built only shortly before the First World War, many of them are very much older. Last century many working class families inherited these somewhat battered relics of a past age, originally built for the wealthier classes and made down in a rough and ready manner for their new tenants. The Report emphasised, however, that not all of these defective houses were suitable for improvement. About 100,000 of them have probably gone too far to be worth modernising and others will fall out on planning grounds—for


example, to make way for new roads, etc. It is not possible to say exactly just how many of these old houses are suitable for improvement.
Broadly speaking, there are three main types of houses ripe for improvement. First, there are big houses, either unoccupied or under-occupied, which can be sub-divided into flats. Second, there are modest houses or flats of three to five rooms in town and country which do not have proper sanitary arrangements and lack other modern conveniences. Many of these houses are in small burghs and villages. Many of them are owner-occupied: I am thinking, for example, of thrifty railwaymen and other workers who bought houses for their families in Abbey-hill and other districts in Edinburgh and of the fishermen round our coasts who take such a pride in the homes which they own in our picturesque fishing villages.

Sir W. Darling: East Edinburgh and Berwickshire.

Mr. Robertson: The third group consists of the many small houses, especially in tenements, which when the new housing programme is further advanced, will have to be combined with others if they are to make reasonable homes for ordinary families. The Report warns us, however, that, unless we adopt an improvement policy, large numbers of families will have to go on living for many years, as in the past, in houses that are already unsatisfactory and are almost certain to deteriorate. The majority Report then recommends financial assistance to local authorities, to private persons and to housing associations.
I have dwelt on the Report at some length because we have lifted the broad framework of the majority recommendations on Scottish housing and have embodied them, with only a very few alterations, in this Bill. I should, therefore, like to take this opportunity of acknowledging the valuable contributions made by the Committee and by the late Mr. Archibald McTaggart in supplying us with material which has been so readily adaptable for purposes of legislation.
The financial assistance proposed is briefly as follows: First, local authorities may receive from the Exchequer three-quarters of their estimated expenses in giving effect to improvement proposals. The proportion in the Highlands and

Islands, however, will be seven-eighths. Secondly, private persons may receive from local authorities grants up to 50 per cent. of the duly accredited estimated expenses in carrying out their improvement proposals. That is the scheme of financial assistance in outline. There are one or two points of policy, however, which I ought to mention,
The first is that work of improvement must not prejudice the building of new houses. I am afraid we shall have to be rather selective, to start with, and shall have to concentrate on houses of sound construction, but with, perhaps, defective sanitary arrangements, which are capable of improvement without loss of accommodation and without too heavy expenditure on scarce materials. Next, we shall gradually be able to bring in improvement involving combination of houses. When that stage is reached, the improvement programme will have to be linked very closely with the programme of new building, in order to ensure that families displaced as the result of the combination of existing houses may be offered other accommodation.
I hope that building labour not usually engaged on new housing, but on jobbing and maintenance work, will be absorbed in improvement operations. There are in many districts in Scotland pools of building labour—mainly among small firms—which could, and should, be employed on the improvement of selected existing houses. At the moment, about 30,000 men are engaged on new housing construction, and about 23,000 on conversions, adaptations and maintenance. Some of these 23,000 men are doing work on the sub-division of residential property for sale to people who are prepared to pay high prices. Some of them are on work of improvement to property which is already reasonably good. We hope that the financial inducements offered by the Bill will have the effect of attracting much of this jobbing labour to essential improvement work. We must, however, watch costs. I regard it as most important in improvement work—as in new building—to encourage competition in the industry to safeguard public funds.
Hon. Members will have observed that grants to private persons are limited to dwellings occupied by the owner or a tenant. If, therefore, the owner of a farm cottage for example, wishes to apply


for a grant, he must first arrange to let the cottage on a tenancy basis. We regard it as a fundamental principle that when public money has been used to improve a house, the relationship between owner and occupier should be one that is defined by Statute and not one in which the owner has the sole right to dispossess the tenant arbitrarily.
A high standard of improvement will normally be expected—a standard as near as possible to that of a new house—a house worth paying a good rent for. The Bill, however, provides for some relaxation of the full standard in exceptional cases.

Mr. Willis: Before my hon. Friend leaves the point about altering the relationship in the case of cottages on agricultural land, may I ask if that gives the tenant full protection under the Rent Restrictions Acts?

Mr. Robertson: Under the new proposals the tenant will be protected by the Rent Restrictions Acts. He will be subject to the provisions of the Acts.

Commander Galbraith: Will the hon. Gentleman deal with the matter further? He is dealing with a situation which arises where a private person makes an improvement in a property, not in any other case?

Mr. Robertson: I took the example of a farmer or landowner who wanted to improve his farm worker's cottage, which would be a tied cottage. He would have to make it a tenancy before he would be eligible for the grant.
I should like to invite the help of all interested in this improvement programme. It is important that our skilled architects and surveyors should be brought in to advise on effective and economical means of carrying out the work. It is often a more intricate and protracted task to convert an old house than to plan and build a new one. I should like to make an appeal to the technicians and to all the skilled craftsmen in the building trade to make use of the latest building methods and the latest fittings and appliances that have come successfully out of the building experiments of the last few years. I shall say something about these building experiments in a moment or two.
I now come to Part III of the Bill, which contains some special subsidy provisions for new housing. I should make it clear that Part III does not deal with the ordinary subsidies for new houses. These will be reviewed in the ordinary course, later in the year. In any case, the machinery for the review is in the 1946 Act, and this Bill would not be the place for such a revision. What Part III does is to provide three new special subsidies to meet special circumstances, namely, an additional subsidy for houses built of special materials to preserve the character of the surroundings; a subsidy for hostels; and an additional subsidy for building experiments. I should like to say a word or two, by way of explanation, about these new subsidy proposals.
The subsidy for houses built of special materials will be additional to the ordinary subsidy payable under the 1946 Act. The additional subsidy is not intended for general stone building. It would not, for example, be available for houses to be built on a virgin site merely because the local authority had already built in stone, or because there were stone houses near at hand. It is intended only for special cases where the cost of providing a house is enhanced because of the use of special materials, for example, the use of stone, for small groups of houses in national park areas: in other areas of outstanding natural beauty; and in gap sites in streets of historic interest, or containing notable examples of Scottish domestic architecture. We have such streets in some of the older Scottish Royal Burghs, like Stirling, Haddington and St. Andrews, and in the famous Royal Mile of Edinburgh.
The subsidy for hostels is part of the policy of making the provisions of the Scottish Housing Acts comprehensive and flexible. The National Assistance Act, 1948, provides subsidy for hostels for old people and others in need of care and attention. What this Bill does is to fill a gap and provide a subsidy for a hostel intended for single people who are not in need of such care and attention, for example, young men and women working away from home, or elderly men who have no homes of their own.
The third subsidy, as I have said, is an additional subsidy for building experiments. Scotland has played a big part in the experimental building work which


has been carried out on an extensive scale since the end of the war. The many types of non-traditional houses which we now see in Scotland are a tribute to the pioneer work which has been carried out by professional builders and other public-spirited and enterprising people. The special subsidy which was made available for the development of non-traditional types has now come to an end and these types are now generally expected to compete with traditional houses and with each other in the open market. The proposed new experimental subsidy has a different object in view. It is intended to encourage individual research projects designed to improve the convenience of the houses to save labour and materials and so reduce costs.
Let me give some examples of research projects which have already been undertaken and are now in progress. The Falkirk area has established a new reputation by its initiative in the development and production of modern solid fuel burning fireplaces and kitchen cookers. I can testify from personal experience to the efficiency of one of the new type convection grates. Think of the convenience of a living room fire heating two or more rooms, when the housewife has to lift out the ash container only about once a week.
Next there are two developments which, if they ultimately prove to be quicker and cheaper than ordinary methods of construction, will be especially useful where there is a scarcity of labour in the finishing trades. Many hon. Members are already aware of the prefabricated interiors which have been developed by the firm of Blackburn, at Dunbarton. The other is a new method of constructing internal load bearing walls, using units, which can be made on the site, manufactured from a mineral in vast deposits in this country, and eliminating altogether the use of plaster and timber. The Scottish Special Housing Association have given valuable help in the past in demonstrating new methods of building and we have arranged with them to try out this latest new method of internal walling in two new houses now started at Sighthill, Edinburgh. We are awaiting the results with hopeful interest.
Part IV of the Bill contains a variety of provisions, intended in the main to make the machinery of the Housing Acts

more flexible. In particular we are giving local authorities wider powers to make advances to private persons, and flexible powers in assisting their tenants, where necessary, to furnish their houses, to obtain meals and to have nearby laundry facilities; and I need touch on only one or two of these miscellaneous provisions. Several questions have been asked by hon. Members this Session about facilities for obtaining loans under the Housing Acts and under the Small Dwellings Acquisition Acts. Since 1919, Scottish local authorities have made advances totalling over £10 million under these Acts to buy, build, convert, improve and repair houses. We recognise that the financial limits placed upon advances under these Acts are no longer applicable to present-day conditions. We have therefore taken this opportunity to give local authorities more discretion, and we have, as in the English Bill, raised from £1,500 to £5,000 the maximum value of a house for which an advance may be made.
Then, hitherto local authorities have had powers to supply furniture and fittings to a house but not to a tenant. A number of them have, however, been selling bedding and essential furniture on hire-purchase terms for many years. It is not the intention of this Government to lag behind the practice of the most progressive local authorities and so we are now giving statutory sanction to this practice.

Sir W. Darling: At what rate of interest is this hire purchase and the lending of money to take place? The hon. Gentleman spoke of £10 million having been advanced for buying, building, etc., small dwellings. What is the rate of interest at present obtaining, and what is it to be in the future? Is it proposed to supply furniture, etc., on the usual hire-purchase terms, which are sometimes considered excessive?

Mr. Robertson: I do not wish to prolong discussion, but the rates of interest are a matter for the local authority in accordance with the terms at which they can borrow money at the present time. Edinburgh Corporation lent at four and a quarter per cent. while building societies lent at four and a half per cent. The rate was always below the building society rate. As I was saying, the proposal is to give statutory sanction to this


practice of local authorities supplying furniture, etc., to the tenants. I think that the House will agree that nothing helps a tenant to set up house so happily as assistance in getting good furniture at reasonable commercial prices.
In conclusion, I think that local authorities and Scottish public opinion generally are strongly in favour of all the main proposals in the Bill. That great Scottish Labour pioneer and advocate of democratic Socialism, the late James Keir Hardie, once said that the real wealth of a nation was not to be found in great imperial possessions or in the vulgar pomp and extravagant pleasures of a privileged class; but rather could the true wealth of a nation be assessed by the degree to which happiness was to be found in the homes of the common people. It is because I believe that this Bill will add in no small measure to the social improvement, well-being and happiness which this Government have sought to bring into the homes of the common people, that I am so glad to have moved the Second Reading.

Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison: I should like to clear up a point on which I think the hon. Gentleman inadvertently gave the facts wrongly. I refer to the question of the financial assistance available to local authorities, which the hon. Gentleman said would be on the basis of three-quarters of the expenditure which they incurred. Surely he meant three-quarters of the annual loss, which is a very different thing.

Mr. Robertson: I am obliged to the hon. and gallant Member for pointing that out. I meant to refer to the annual loss.

6.30 p.m.

Commander Galbraith: I am certain that it is the wish of the House that I should take the earliest opportunity of congratulating the Under-Secretary on the manner in which he has presented this Bill for Second Reading, and that particularly because it is the first occasion on which he has moved such a Motion from that Box. May I add that I much preferred his factual approach to the subject to his political approach; indeed, I found it somewhat difficult to swallow some of the political references which he made.
I am certain that the hon. Gentleman will not take it as any reflection upon the clarity of his exposition if I go over certain of the points which he made in very considerable detail and place my own interpretation on the consequences which may flow from them. Of course, Part I of the Bill is quite simple. All that it does is to remove the words "working classes," and I think here that the hon. Gentleman was surely mistaken. He seemed to think that these words being in previous Statutes conveyed some stigma, when of course they did nothing of the kind. All they did convey was the type of people who required their housing accommodation to be attended to and those who perhaps could not afford to pay an economic rent.
The removal of those words imposes on the local authority the duty of providing houses for the entire community. In recent years we have been told time and again, by the Government that while the present shortage of houses exists, and while there are such strict limitations on the building of houses for owner occupation, it is essential, that houses should be allotted strictly in accordance with the housing need and without reference to any other criteria whatsoever, such as financial circumstances. So that on the short view, what Part I of the Bill does is to recognise and regularise a situation which has already existed for some considerable time.
Were that the only effect, I think we could accept Part I with great equanimity. But before we do accept it, it may well be prudent to consider other implications which undoubtedly arise. The House will agree with the hon. Member when he says it is undesirable that our new housing estates should be occupied merely by one type of citizen, whether that citizen is selected by income or otherwise; that the ideal at which we aim is a mixed population and also a diversity of layout and architectural design. If this part of the Bill could be limited to achieve these things without throwing any additional burden either on the taxpayer or the ratepayer, then it would be worthy of a pæan of praise.
But that would not appear to be the case, because according to the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum, the operation of Part I will increase the charge to the Exchequer. In other


words, if we are to build houses for the entire community, rich and poor alike, these houses are, seemingly, to be provided by subsidy. What in reality we are contemplating, in spite of what the hon. Gentleman said, is that while the majority of the population will have for a very considerable period of time to put up with accommodation which is out of tune with modern needs and modern ideas, they are at the same time to be forced to subscribe to provide others with the best of houses that modern science can devise. In my opinion, that is inequitable and unthinkable under present conditions.

Miss Herbison: Is it not the case that in Scotland at present county councils, or the local authority, allocate houses for people with the greatest need, whether they are miners, teachers, bank clerks, or whatever they are?

Commander Galbraith: Yes, of course. That is exactly the point I have been making. Yet it will be seen that if the whole community is to be catered for, undoubtedly the cost must rise—I shall refer to this time and again during my remarks —and poorer people will undoubtedly be subsidising those who are better off. As I said, to my mind that is highly inequitable and unthinkable under present circumstances.
My personal view is that subsidised housing should be provided only for those who cannot pay an economic rent, as otherwise many will be subsidising those better off than themselves. I would remind the House of the words spoken by the Chancellor of the Exchequer during his Budget speech, which I believe are relevant. He said that there is not much further room for the equalisation of incomes by taxation. I take that to mean, in other words, that Government expenditure, of which the housing subsidies form a part, has now to be met out of the pockets of the many instead of out of the bank accounts of the few.
Apart altogether from the unfair burden which will result from providing subsidised houses for the whole population, I think we should observe the opportunities for coercion which this places at the disposal of both local authorities and the Government. Between them they will exercise practically complete con-

trol, both over housing developments and the allocation of houses. The latter applies particularly in the urban areas. In future it may well be that the only houses to be built will be those which the local authorities see fit to build. That seems to me further to narrow the range of choice which the private citizen has at present, and also the possibility, at any rate, of greater variation in architecture and in layout. Indeed, I would have preferred it, if the local authorities had been instructed to lay aside areas of reasonable size for development by private persons. In that way we should probably have achieved what the Government desires, to a greater extent. We should certainly have avoided the payment of large sums by way of subsidy.
From another angle altogether I doubt the wisdom of the step which is here being taken. Under the present system, by which a very great proportion of building is done by the local authority—in Scotland the proportion is ten local authority houses to one built for private persons; in England the proportion is nothing like so great, being 3.75 to one, and I am told that in England they are getting on faster than we are in Scotland—never in my opinion shall we obtain a reduction in the cost of housing, which is such a very serious matter just now, until someone has a personal interest in bringing about that reduction. In other words, the cost will not be reduced until builders are faced with building at a competitive price and in that price securing their own livelihood—whether we call it profit or something else. Until that applies, neither shall we see any improvement, any real reduction, in the time taken to build houses. It may be that we are reducing still further the opportunity of the private builder to show what he can do.

Mr. Willis: What prevents the private builder from showing what he can do when he is building for the local authorities?

Commander Galbraith: Will the hon. Gentleman try to get a licence to build to start with? That would be a very good exercise, and the hon. Gentleman would find out the difficulties.

Mr. Willis: That is not the point I raised. The private builder is already building houses for local authorities.

Commander Galbraith: If the hon. Gentleman will have patience, I shall come to the very subject with which he desires me to deal. I am perfectly aware that hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite hold the view that because the local authorities are employing private builders, then they must be obtaining the full economic advantage of free enterprise. But, of course, that is not so at all. The full economic advantage of free enterprise building will only be obtained when builders are able to secure sites, a continuity of work and a supply of materials in the right quantity at the right time and in the right order on the sites. They must he able to arrange these matters for themselves instead of being at the mercy of people outside their own organisation.
There is one other point on which I find myself constantly in disagreement with hon. Gentlemen opposite—particularly do I find myself in disagreement with the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Scotland. They claim, and I think the right hon. Gentleman has said so in answer to Questions, that private persons can only build for sale, and that to allow houses to be built for sale today, in some way defeats the claim to housing of those in greatest need. That is an argument which I believe to be to a large extent, fallacious. What we want just now are houses. It does not matter a very great deal whether they are for sale or to let. Every house means additional accommodation. If by allowing private builders to build, even for sale only, we were producing the extra 100,000 houses in Great Britain of which I believe the British building industry is capable, that would greatly relieve our waiting lists and would be a great boon and benefit to the community.

Mr. William Ross: What waiting lists?

Commander Galbraith: The waiting lists of the various cities, towns and burghs.

Mr. Ross: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has already said that he would not have on these waiting lists people who can afford to house themselves.

Commander Galbraith: That is just the point. If we had been building houses for sale, they would have been off the

waiting lists and out of the way. In the meantime, they are in the queue. In the long run, my impression, which I hold with certainty, is that the housing needs of the country would be cleared far quicker than they are likely to be under the existing system. For the reasons I have given, we on this side of the House will endeavour during the Committee stage, to devise safeguards against the all-embracing extension of the building powers of the local authorities.
I turn to Part II of the Bill, which provides for assistance for the conversion of existing buildings and the reconstruction, alteration or improvement of existing dwellings. The last census was taken in 1931. At that time we had 1,147,000 houses in Scotland. In the following eight years, that is, to the end of 1939, we built 189,638 houses. During the war, we added another 28,270 and since then there have been built 43,325 houses. Of course, I refer to permanent houses only. That gives us a total of 1,408,000 houses. I think that we would be right to exclude from that figure the houses in slum clearance schemes. If we do, in round figures we are probably dealing with about 1,25.0,000 houses in Scotland. We all know, to our cost, that that number is far too few to enable us to provide a house for every family, and that many more are required. Further, we must face the fact that during 1948 we built something short of 20,000 permanent houses in Scotland. From the indications given by the Secretary of State for Scotland, there seems to be little ground for us to hope or to expect that building in the near future will proceed at a higher rate. However, we live in hopes.

Mr. J. J. Robertson: It might be advisable for the record that I should correct the figure given by the hon. and gallant Gentleman. Actually, slightly over 21,000 permanent houses were built in 1948.

Commander Galbraith: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has corrected me. I find difficulty in reconciling the figures given by the present Government. In the Monthly Digest of Statistics for March, the figures appear on page 70. I have added them myself. The total is 19,711, but I am perfectly prepared to accept the figure given by the hon. Gentleman.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Woodburn): These are local authority houses?

Commander Galbraith: Permanent houses. It may be true that they are local authority houses, but that is the heading on this page. Hon. Members will see that I am correct if they examine the figures.
It is obvious that any sound houses which we have, must be conserved, because they will be required for many long years yet. Any additional houses that we can get by conversion, we must indeed secure. As the Joint Under-Secretary said, these old houses of good construction must be brought up to date. That must be done not only because public opinion demands it, but also because in equity we cannot expect people to live in out-of-date houses while they are helping to pay for the provision of modern conditions for others who may be better off than themselves. Surely, all in this House agree to that principle. We on this side have contended during the whole period of office of the present Government that in the rural areas there were tradesmen capable of doing the work of modernisation and improvement whom one could not incorporate into any team for the building of new houses. I am glad that at last we had confirmation of that view in the speech of the hon. Gentleman this afternoon. Further, I hope that the introduction of this Measure means that the hon. Gentleman and his right hon. Friend have found that similar men also exist in our towns, cities and burghs. If that is not so, I really cannot see much object in introducing this part of the Bill.
I wish to examine the proposals put forward in this Measure and to see whether they achieve the end it is desired to secure. It may well be that the local authorities will be able to achieve the object which the Government have in view, because they are only called upon to meet one-quarter of the loss; but I doubt very much whether the terms of Part II can possibly encourage any private owner to go ahead with an improvements scheme. Let me say at once that one can make no comparison whatever between the conditions of owners in Scotland and those of owners in England. For England the terms may be perfectly satisfactory, but, as far as I can discover

—and I shall try to put the picture as I see it before the House—in Scotland the terms are anything but satisfactory. One of the reasons for the difference in the situation of owners in the two countries is that ever since the passing of the Rent Restriction Act, 1920, the owner in England has received an increase of 40 per cent. on the 1914 rent, whereas in Scotland, solely as a result of the operation of our owners' rates and the increase which has been incurred in those rates, in Glasgow today the owner is receiving only 161 per cent. above the 1914 rent. We know that the cost of repairs has increased by 300 per cent. since 1939, and I do not think, therefore, that there is any wonder that, during the 12 months ended last October, some 930 houses should have been offered to the Glasgow Corporation free of charge.
I have here a number of statements for which I did not ask but which have been sent to me relating to the results arising from the ownership of property in the City of Glasgow during the year which ended at Whitsuntide, 1948. These properties were held by trustees, some for public bodies and some for private individuals. May I give the House the result of that year's working? On a rental of £227, the loss was £9 10s.; on £349 a loss of £32; on £469 a loss of £33; on £368 a loss of £25; on £322 a loss of £15; on £283 a loss of £13; and on a rental of £602 there was a loss of £16. That kind of thing is happening today not only all over Glasgow but all over Scotland as well, and in my opinion it represents the gravest threat to our housing standards in Scotland. I do not believe that the dilapidations which are taking place are equalled by the replacements.

Mr. Ross: Could the hon. and gallant Gentleman give us some idea of the loss during the war years, when very little repair work was done?

Commander Galbraith: I have not got the figures for the war years. I did not ask for these figures; they were sent to me, but I think they are of very great interest. I believe that this is one of the most serious threats to our housing standards at present, and yet in this Bill, which is called the Housing (Scotland) Bill, there is no cognisance of this serious aspect of the situation. I do not know what is the reason for that.
It may be that the Bill is merely an imitation of the English Bill and, without wishing to give offence, I want to say to the right hon. Gentleman that I wish he would appear to do somethng on his own initiative. He may be doing it, but be does not appear to be doing it, and I would like to see him doing more on his own, or at least appearing to do it. I am perfectly safe in saying to him that hon. Members on this side of the House, and I think also hon. Members on the other side, are getting somewhat tired of Scottish legislation constantly being tagged on to an English Bill or being an absolutely slavish copy of it, which only results in dealing in an ineffective way with circumstances in Scotland which are quite different from those in England. I ask the right hon. Gentleman what he is doing about this serious situation. I am quite certain that he is not going to sit and watch this decay taking place, perhaps from the eminence of St. Andrew's House.

Mr. Woodburn: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has been talking about a serious situation and about Scottish legislation being something that is tagged on to an English Bill. Does he never give Scotland any credit for anything? Does he not realise that in this case, the English Bill came in because of Scottish initiative in making this investigation?

Commander Galbraith: I feel all the more sorry that the investigation has not been more fruitful, because it seems to me that it will not help Scotland one little bit. I want to know what the Secretary of State is going to do about this decay that is taking place. Surely, he will not sit and watch it, as I say, from the eminence of St. Andrew's House, but will come down into the street and do something about it before it is too late? If not, we shall have houses all over Scotland that are literally falling down because, as a result of legislation, the owners simply have not got the money to deal with them. It is against that background that we have to consider the provisions of Part II of the Bill so far as it deals with improvements to houses by private persons. We have to ask whether it is likely to be effective, and I submit that, over a great range of property which is capable of reconstruction, the answer is "No."
For the purpose of my argument and as an illustration, I want to consider what happens to an owner who makes an improvement costing £600, of which he has to pay £300. On those amounts he is allowed to increase the rent by 6 per cent. per year, or £18 per annum. What charges are involved in that increase? He has to pay increased rates, which in Glasgow would amount to £5 9s. 6d., and he has to pay Property Tax, which would amount to £3 12s. Then, he has to put aside something for repairs, which, according to the experts who gave evidence before this Committee, should be allowed for to the extent of 25 per cent. of the rent per year, which is £4 10s. The sinking fund at 2 per cent. would mean £6, and the interest on his £300 investment, at the rate which the Government are now going to allow—3¼ per cent.—would call for an additional £9 15s. So he has to put aside a total of £29 6s. 6d., and so, on a property on which he is probably already out of pocket, the improvement which he makes in the interests of his tenant and of the local authorities and the State increases his loss by £11 6s. 6d. With taxation at its present high level and with the cost of living as high as it is, does the right hon. Gentleman believe that anyone is going to be able to indulge their charitable inclinations to that extent?
What I find difficult to believe is that the right hon. Gentleman himself has studied this Report, though the Under-Secretary has referred to it. Both of them should be aware that all these facts are fully set out in paragraphs 110–113 and also on pages 56–59, but with this difference, to which the Under-Secretary referred, that, while the Committe recommended grants of 75 per cent. of the cost, the present Bill suggests only grants of 50 per cent.

Mr. Ross: I think it was up to 75 per cent.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman may be right; I do not remember the exact words, although 75 per cent. was the figure that stuck in my mind. If that proposition of 75 per cent. is uneconomic, as the Report shows it to be, how does the right hon. Gentleman expect the proposals in the Bill to be of any use? Is he again merely following—or is it leading?—England on this occa-


sion, or has he fought a battle in the Cabinet and lost it? Has there been a refusal to look at Scottish conditions and make the increased grants which are necessary to meet them, or it is simply that the Government are content that it should remain impossible for private owners to improve their property and so provide an excuse for a local authority stepping in and expropriating the owners? The local authority can proceed to do the work themselves with a much more generous grant given to them and with no limitation on the rents which they can charge. These are serious points, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman is taking them seriously, and that, when he replies, he will state plainly what his intentions are.
One of the strangest things about this Bill is that the one type of property which the owners might consider it worth their while to improve under the conditions which the Bill provides, is that type of property which is excluded altogether from the scheme—the service cottage. Why it is excluded I cannot imagine, not even after listening to the hon. Gentleman's explanation. What did the Minister of Health say during the Debate on the English Bill on 16th March? The right hon. Gentleman said:
The Government do not see why people should go on living in unconverted houses that are structurally sound when it is perfectly practicable now to bring them up to proper standards.
Again, he said:

"The purpose of the grant is to enable the occupant of the house to enjoy modern amenities…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 16th March, 1949; Vol. 462, c. 2138–9.]
Of course, he should have added, "excepting always the key men in the agricultural industry who, by reason of the nature of their employment, have to reside on the farm and in close proximity to their work. These men, so long as the Socialist Government are in power, shall always be excluded from any benefit which might arise under this Bill."
The Government's attitude is so utterly and absolutely ridiculous in reference to this matter that I am going to make an offer which I mean seriously and genuinely. If any hon. Member is prepared to pay a visit of 24 hours' duration, or longer if he likes, to any dairy

farm in Ayrshire, and to accompany the dairyman on his duties during the 24 hours, and then says that it is practicable to run such a farm without the certain knowledge that accommodation will always be available in the immediate vicinity, as required for those who tend the herd, then I am prepared to pay the cost of having that gentleman and myself examined by any mental expert whom he may suggest so that it may be decided with certainty whether he or I should be in Gartnaval or The Crighton, or some similar institution—because it is perfectly clear that, in those circumstances, both of us should not be at large.

Mr. Hector Hughes: Has the hon. and gallant Gentleman considered whether he is infringing the Gaming Acts in making that offer?

Commander Galbraith: No, I am merely making a straightforward business proposition of which the hon. and learned Gentleman can avail himself if he chooses.
Other observations were made by the Minister of Health on the English Bill and repeated, more or less, in substance by the hon. Gentleman today, observations to the effect that it was repugnant to hon. Members opposite that possession of a man's home should be bound up with his contract of employment. Was greater nonsense than that ever spoken in this House at a time when right hon. Gentlemen are falling over themselves to get service cottages? We have the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary demanding service cottages for the police; we have the Service Ministers demanding service cottages for the men of the Army, Navy and Air Force and their wives and families; and we have the same plea in regard to forestry. Why is it that hon. Members opposite cannot recognise straightforwardly the fact that there are certain occupations where a service cottage is absolutely necessary if essential services are to be maintained? I will leave the matter there because, no doubt, some of my hon. Friends will deal with it fully later on.

Mr. Scollan: Is it not a fact that in the case of Service men, of forestry and of the particular trades which the hon. and gallant Gentleman has quoted, the people concerned are the employees of the Government or


the municipality, who are entitled to provide the houses, whereas the argument he is now putting up is that the Government should erect houses for the employees of private owners?

Commander Galbraith: The argument I am putting up is that where houses are required to maintain an essential service, they should be provided in the interest of the public. There is no difference between the various categories I have mentioned on that point.
I now wish to deal very briefly with Part III, under which assistance is to be given to preserve the character of a locality and to blend the houses in with the surroundings. I am sure that everyone agrees with the provision that is made, but I hope that by the use of local materials we may, in the majority of cases, get a reduction in the cost, and not an increase, as seems to be envisaged in the Bill. Then there is assistance for the provision of hostels to which the hon. Gentleman referred, hostels which are to provide residential accommodation and also board. It would appear that the intention is that these hostels should be subsidised; in fact, that those who use them are going to obtain benefits for less than the economic cost, whether they can afford to pay the economic cost or not. I should like to know whether that is the intention of the right hon. Gentleman. I, personally, do not think that in the present financial position of the country this subsidy is warranted at all. I am all the more inclined to that opinion because this, again, is going to involve payment by poorer people for those better off than themselves. Of course, in regard to experiments in building, of which the hon. Gentleman gave us so many interesting examples, no exception whatsoever is taken.
I come to the extension of the existing powers of local authorities in making advances to private persons or in guaranteeing advances made by building societies to private persons. We on this side believe that the ownership of property by private persons is to the benefit of the entire community, and accordingly we welcome these proposals in principle, provided that, in making the advances, no loss whatsoever falls on the taxpayer, and that all the expenses incurred by a

local authority shall be covered by the charge made on the gentleman receiving the loan. In regard to both that and other matters, we feel that anomalies may be created, and, therefore, we are going to consider amending these provisions in the Committee stage.
Lastly, I wish to refer very briefly to the powers granted to local authorities in the provision of laundry facilities and to the sale of furniture. I am averse to local authorities competing at any time, either in trade or in the provision of services, with their own ratepayers, except where it is proved to the complete satisfaction of some neutral party that private citizens are quite unable or unwilling to provide a reasonable service.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: How would the hon. and gallant Gentleman define a "neutral party"?

Commander Galbraith: I should think the hon. Gentleman might be one; I should certainly be ready to trust him to exercise judgment in these matters.
I entirely agree that the local authority ought to provide communal facilities of the most up-to-date kind, so that the housewife may be relieved to the greatest possible extent of the back-breaking burden of doing the family washing under cramped conditions; but if what the right hon. Gentleman intends is to set up municipal laundries, then, except in the circumstances which I have already mentioned, I entirely disapprove, and the same reasoning defines my attitude with reference to the sale of furniture. This service should not be undertaken by the local authority except where the existing service or facility is inadequate in one respect or another; and, where it is undertaken by the local authority, it should be economic and not subsidised.
From the tenor of my general observations it will be clear to the House that while we on this side accept this Bill in principle, we do so on the condition and on the reasonable expectation that we shall be able to amend it during the Committee and subsequent stages. It is in that expectation, therefore, that we do not intend to oppose its Second Reading.

7.9 p.m.

Mr. McAllister: The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) said in the course of


his speech that he finds some difficulty in grasping statistics as presented by His Majesty's Government. We on this side have a somewhat similar difficulty in grasping some of the arguments which he presented in criticising this Bill. He seemed to be making a very important declaration of Tory policy when he said that in his view the building of houses for sale would not defeat the housing of persons in greatest need. That seems a most extraordinary statement. I have great respect for the hon. and gallant Member's reasoning powers, but it baffles me to find anything that could substantiate any such argument.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman must continue the argument which I put forward. My argument was based on the assumption that by building houses for sale we could build many more houses than are being built at the present time.

Mr. McAllister: That qualification only makes the argument more extraordinary, because the hon. and gallant Gentleman is obviously indicting private enterprise when he makes that remark. He is saying that the Scottish building industry, only a very tiny portion of which is in the hands of local authorities and only an infinitesimal proportion of which is in the hands of the State, is not building as many houses as it could build. I see that hon. Members opposite appear to agree that that is a correct rendering of the hon. and gallant Gentleman's argument.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman must not say that, because it is a complete travesty of what I said. The hon. Gentleman cannot have been listening. If he will read the OFFICIAL REPORT tomorrow he will see how wrong he is.

Mr. McAllister: I assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that I have been listening with the greatest care, and I tried very hard to follow his argument. He said that if houses were built for sale, the people who wanted to buy houses would be off the corporation waiting lists. The hon. and gallant Gentleman should not attempt to dodge his own argument but should try to substantiate it. He is clearly saying beyond a peradventure that the number of houses being built

in Scotland today is not the number that could be built if the Scottish building industry was going full out. I suggest that that is simply an indictment of his own friends and associates, and not of the Government. We on this side of the House would not make such a charge against his own colleagues. We believe that, on the whole, the Scottish building industry is doing its best.

Commander Galbraith: It is doing its best under the prevailing conditions, when it is absolutely tied hand and foot by red tape and by the regulations which the Government lay down.

Mr. McAllister: The argument gets more and more interesting. "Doing its best under conditions of red tape and control"—now we are on familiar Tory ground. The Tories would sweep away all these controls and all these regulations just as they would make the houses available for sale. I happen to know that in Inverness today there are houses being built for sale by private enterprise which are taking a great deal longer to build than any local authority houses which know of in the whole of Scotland.

Commander Galbraith: That might be so in the case of a house built on top of a mountain.

Mr. McAllister: I am not talking of houses on the tops of mountains. The hon. and gallant Gentleman should know his geography a little better than to imagine that Inverness is on top of a mountain. The hon. and gallant Gentleman's argument cannot be sustained. We on this side of the House are willing to admit that we are not satisfied with the number of houses that have been erected in Scotland or which will be erected in the next 12 months, but when we can build 28,000 houses in one year—

Commander Galbraith: Permanent houses?

Mr. McAllister: No, we should not argue in this quibbling fashion. The hon. and gallant Gentleman himself said that 20,000 permanent houses were erected in Scotland last year, and when he was corrected by the Under-Secretary of State he admitted that the figure was, in fact, 21,000. If one adds to that the temporary houses that were built in Scotland last year, the total figure is 28,000. When we have built 28,000


houses in Scotland in one year it does not lie in the mouth of any hon. Member opposite to cast any slur on this Government for any failure in housing, because our 28,000 houses three years after the war, represent far more houses than the Tories managed to build in Scotland in any year between the two wars.
The hon. and gallant Gentleman then made another extraordinary claim. He suggested that it was very unfair to these poor Glasgow property-owners, with all these repairs to make and all these rates to pay, that they could not charge an economic rent. He said he hoped that something would be done about it "before the houses fell down." That struck me as a very pregnant remark. I represent the Royal Burgh of Rutherglen. It is not like the constituency which the hon. and gallant Gentleman represents; it is a little town of 20,000 people, but with as high a density of population as is to be found in the worst parts of Glasgow. We have there tenement buildings that are owned by private property-owners for whom the hon. and gallant Gentleman has such great sympathy. It is an astonishing fact that since the war ended, so many of these old properties have fallen down in Rutherglen that giving homes to their inhabitants, caught up with the supply of new houses—fallen down literally, so that the people have had to go on to the streets and all sorts of emergency measures have had to be taken to give them temporary accommodation. What the hon. and gallant Gentleman said had very little relevance to the Bill. He was trying to build up a purely party political case which had no substance in it whatsoever. His eye was probably on the municipal elections in Glasgow, rather than on the subject matter of this Debate.

Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison: This is not a party point. It is a question of economics. Here we have an investment, or a method of expending money, which is certain to bring in a loss as things are now. Would the hon. Gentleman buy property in those circumstances?—because I should be very glad to arrange for him to have quite a lot free.

Mr. McAllister: The hon. and gallant Gentleman is raising quite a different point. I think there is unanimous agree-

ment on all sides of the House that the time is probably overdue when the Rent Restriction Acts should be reconsidered, and a new body of legislation dealing with a very thorny and difficult problem is a matter of some urgency.

Lieut.-Commander Clark Hutchison: Is not the hon. Gentleman aware that questions have frequently been put to the Government—to the Minister of Health and to the Secretary of State for Scotland—about that matter, and that the Government have said that they will not introduce legislation dealing with the revision of the Rent Restriction Acts?

Mr. McAllister: I am not a member of the Government and, therefore, I cannot speak for them. They have their legislative time-table. I am replying to the hon. and gallant Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel Hutchison), and I am saying that there is fairly unanimous opinion in all quarters of the House that the general revision of the Rent Restriction Acts and of the whole law affecting landlord and tenant is something which calls for the attention of all parties. There is a need for a systematic review of the whole matter.

Mr. Willis: But not to increase rents.

Mr. McAllister: No.

Mr. Willis: That is what hon. Members opposite want.

Mr. McAllister: I want to get a fair arrangement all round and I am prepared to concede that there is a certain inequity in the Rent Restriction Acts as they stand. I fully agree with that, but it is quite another thing to say that it applies to conversion and to the proposals in this Bill, because there was nothing to prevent any landlord at any time before the war from converting a Glasgow tenement. Landlords by the thousand have done it in London, and with great success for themselves and for their tenants. Scotland has sadly lagged behind on the whole question of conversion. I think great credit is due to the MacTaggart Committee, as the Minister remarked, for having given the nation this Report which serves as an example not only to Scotland but to England and Wales. But in the practical matter of conversion there have been a thousand times more


conversions in the County of London area, for example, than in the whole of Scotland.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Member knows perfectly well the reason for that. Will he not admit it? It is simply due to the owners' rates. He knows that.

Mr. McAllister: If, as the hon. and gallant Member says, it is simply due to the owners' rates, then the hon. and gallant Member was a Member of the party opposite when they were in power and when they could have introduced a reform of the Scottish rating system, which, as almost everybody is agreed, is a matter calling for some attention. We cannot do everything in one Bill. All I am saying is that more conversion has been done in London than has been done in Scotland and that more conversion has been done in many parts of the world than Scotland has begun to do. If one thinks of the capital city of Scotland, with the Royal Mile, I think the corporation of Edinburgh, the regimental associations and many great voluntary organisations have done a remarkably good job in taking the great historic tenements of Scotland, which were dreadful slums, and turning them into buildings of dignity, beauty and social usefulness. The city of Geneva is equally an old city and equally a Calvinistic city, and one would find there that the old university city was also riddled with slums, but the corporation of Geneva took over the university city, and converted the slums into first-rate houses so that the university part is becoming once again the social and intellectual centre of Geneva. Edinburgh and Glasgow could very well follow such an example.

Sir William Darling: They did not fight two wars in Switzerland.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: They were wiser.

Mr. McAllister: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) on that point. I think the hon. Member for South Edinburgh (Sir W. Darling) will, on further thought, regret that he has cast any kind of reflection at all on the Swiss people who have given to the world an example of what democratic civilisa-

tion really means. We are getting slightly away from the Bill, however. I was astonished by the vehemence of the attack by the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok, because most of the things in this Bill are things which I thought would have been welcomed by hon. Members of all parties. I think we all welcome the conversion of the larger houses into smaller, more convenient houses. I think we all welcome the extension of the boundaries of Scottish housing legislation to embrace the whole community and not merely to have regard to one particular section of the community.

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: That would do away with Socialism and the class war.

Mr. McAllister: The hon. and gallant Member is entirely wrong. Keir Hardie, to whom reference has been made, did not preach class war in the sense that he wanted to set class against class. He merely saw in Society, as a great Tory leader, Disraeli also saw, acute class divisions and he wanted to abolish them. The whole object of Socialism and the whole object of our legislation in the end is to produce a society in which class divisions disappear and in which we are all [HON. MEMBERS: "Poorer"]—not poorer, although some people will be poorer, but in which nearly everybody will be infinitely richer, not only in material things but in spiritual things as well.
Everyone should welcome the provision of hostels and restaurants. In a city such as Glasgow with hundreds of young men living away from their homes, there is a need for some kind of accommodation in which they will have restaurant facilities and some social facilities as well. Surely that is not a Committee point; that is something which could be regarded as a good point in the Bill. I should have thought hon. Members in every part of the House would welcome the provisions whereby local authorities are to use local materials in building houses. That is not merely a matter of aesthetics, although I am interested in the aesthetic aspect; it is a matter of encouraging, here and there, small local industries which can be most important and which ought to be encouraged. I hope that this Bill, even if it takes some


time to come into full operation, will help to provide a diversity of architecture and a standard of architecture such as, in our more hasty building, we have seldom been able to achieve. We have a great architectural tradition in Scotland and the proper application of this Bill should help us to maintain it and extend it. I should like to congratulate the Joint Under-Secretary of State on the way in which he introduced this Bill and to assure him that it has our warmest support.

7.27 p.m.

Mr. Spence: I do not intend to follow the argument of the hon. Member for Rutherglen (Mr. McAllister), although I agree with what he said in the latter part of his speech about the encouragement of the use of local material by local authorities. I noticed that he said that we all welcomed the Bill and he rather skated over one point which was touched on only very lightly by the Joint Under-Secretary of State when he introduced the Bill; that is, the effect the provisions of Part II of the Bill will have on the reconditioning of rural houses in Scotland. I think the House is aware that my constituency is part of one of the greatest agricultural counties in Scotland and we are deeply concerned about the effect of this Bill on reconditioning.
We had high hopes that the Bill would include provisions which would carry on the work done under the Housing (Rural Workers) Act. I remember in the earlier days of this Parliament, when it first met in August, 1945—I think the date was 17th August—an announcement was suddenly made to us from the Front Bench opposite by the former Lord Privy Seal that the Housing (Rural Workers) Act was to be discontinued. I remember that he was questioned by my hon. Friend the Member for East Fife (Mr. Henderson Stewart) as to what would be the position, and after some pressure he used these words:
The Secretary of State for Scotland hopes to supersede it"—
that is, the Housing (Rural Workers) Act—
by something which will be more fruitful than that Act has been in Scotland. We can be held to that promise."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 17th August, 1945; Vol. 413. c. 257.]

Agriculturists all over Scotland have been waiting for that promise to be fulfilled. We thought that this Bill would fulfil it and I put to the Under-Secretary a question which I hope he will answer, or which his right hon. Friend will answer in winding up the Debate. Does he expect that the provisions of Part II of his Bill will lead to a broad measure of reconditioning and improvement of service cottages on the farms in Scotland? I would remind the House that under the Housing (Rural Workers) Act, 33,000 houses were reconditioned in Scotland. I do not believe—and I hope to show the House in a moment how bad this Bill is in this respect—that this new Measure we are considering, will do anything for rural housing at all. Scottish farming depends, as to practically 90 per cent., upon service cottages for the housing of the farm workers. The system of the service cottage is the only system which is economic and practical for providing accommodation for those who work on the mixed farms which suit our particular climate and soil. The stipulation of the Bill is that any cottage for which a reconditioning grant is sought, must first be declared by the owner untied, even before an application for grant can be made. That is the provision.
I ask—and I hope we may have a reply tonight—what is the position of the owner if for some reason a grant is not given? What is the position of the owner if the grant is not considered by him sufficient to justify going ahead with the alteration? We must know. Then there is the case of the owner who has accepted a grant and reconditioned the cottage and untied it, but who may wish subsequently to tie it again to his farm. So far as I understand it, the position is that the owner repays the grant. That is fair enough under the provisions of the Bill as it is drafted. Then he applies to the local authority for permission to re-tie the cottage. He does not have the right to re-tie the cottage; he applies for permission to re-tie it; and even then, it is subject to the tenancy of the sitting tenant. So I say that those conditions which are attached to the reconditioning of tied cottages in Scotland make this Bill, so far as reconditioning is concerned worthless and useless.
It is safe to say that approximately 25 per cent. of the farms in Scotland are


owner-occupied, and that the other 75 per cent. are occupied by tenant farmers. There are one or two other questions which I want to have answered. Will the owner-occupier run the risk of lowering the value of his farm by untying his cottages? It must be appreciated in all quarters of the House that the service cottage is essential, especially on farms in remote areas. The ordinary, medium sized farm has probably four cottages. In remote areas especially, the cottages must be tied to the farm. If the owner-occupier unties his cottages, his farm is no longer worth what it was, because he cannot sell it. That is a factor that must be faced, and hon. Members, however much they may dislike the tied cottage, must realise that the objections to accepting a grant on the condition of untying cottages, are so great that the Bill, so far as reconditioning of farm cottages is concerned, just will not operate.
Next I have in mind the case of the tenant farmer. He has probably in his lease a clause agreed with the owner of the farm that the owner shall provide suitable cottages, to enable the tenant to employ men to help him to keep the farm in accordance with the new agricultural law. If the owner of the land unties those cottages to recondition them, he breaks the lease with his tenant. Therefore, once again we come to a stalemate. I cannot see how the Secretary of State, when he winds up tonight, can say with sincerity that the reconditioning Clauses in the Bill will be of real benefit to the farming community in Scotland, or will give results in any way comparable to those achieved under the old Housing (Rural Workers) Act.
The Secretary of State himself is, after all, the largest estate owner in Scotland. Will he untie all the cottages on his farms? Will he untie the houses tied to his other interests in Scotland, and see how he gets on for a year or two? If it is so wicked to have tied cottages surely the Forestry Commission ought not to be building more tied houses today, and surely we should not be authorising tied houses to be built under the National Health Service in Scotland, and under the water schemes? What will the Government do about the 150,000 houses that the National Coal Board owns, and the 50,000 owned by the railways? It seems that hon. Members

opposite hold the view that a tied house, when the owner is the State, is a blessing, but that a tied house, when the owner is a private individual, is a curse.

Mr. Willis: Surely what is at issue is the giving of public money for the improvement of private property over which the Government and the local authorities have no control?

Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison: The Bill is doing that already. The only condition that is made is that houses should be untied. The principle of improving the property of somebody else is in the Bill.

Mr. Spence: I thank my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel Hutchison) for that assistance. His intervention completely answers the point. I conclude by saying that Scotland has a great service to give Britain in the provision of food from its farms. Scotland has many counties celebrated for special products of every kind. In Scotland we have special products from our farms, and I think that Scotland, in relation to Great Britain as a whole, stands higher in this respect than any part of Britain. The Minister of Food and the Minister of Agriculture have told us what we are expected to do. I say it is up to the Government to help, and that, since they have put these provisions into the Bill, they should see they are removed. The Secretary of State would then be conferring a real benefit on the country. He would confer a benefit on us if he would remove these bad provisions from the Bill before it reaches the Committee stage, and so allow this Bill to do good, and to carry on the good work that was carried on in the past under the Housing (Rural Workers) Act.

7.38 p.m.

Mrs. Cullen: I think the Bill will go a long way in helping to solve our housing problem. Nevertheless, I do not feel that it is of para mount importance so far as Glasgow is concerned, especially the Gorbals. On 17th December, I made my maiden speech, pleading that something should be done for the unfortunate people in the Gorbals. Four months have elapsed and nothing has been done. There are no signs of clearing the slums, and the reconstruction of the old houses in the Gorbals, in my opinion, is about 20 years too late.


There is not an empty cellar in the Gorbals, never mind a house. Therefore, I would plead with the Secretary of State for action in this matter. If there is plentiful material now, before we start reconditioning old houses, and so use up our material, something should be done to clear away the slums and rehouse the people of the Gorbals. I am always much perturbed when I go home at the week-ends hoping to see this good work started, to find that, unfortunately, nothing has been done so far. I plead with the Secretary of State to use the materials, not on the reconstruction of old buildings in Glasgow, but for the housing of the people of the Gorbals.

7.40 p.m.

Lieut.-Commander Clark Hutchison: This is a Bill of very considerable importance both to the people of Scotland and to the local authorities in Scotland as many of its provisions refer to local government work. There is no doubt that we shall have to subject it to very close examination in the Scottish Grand Committee, as, indeed, is usually the fate of most Scottish Bills. There are a great many questions of detail and some of finance which one can raise on this Measure, but I will leave the financial details to my hon. Friend the Member for South Edinburgh (Sir W. Darling), who is winding up for the Opposition and who is more of an expert in that line than I am.
I want to refer especially to the provisions of Part II of the Bill which deal with the reconditioning and modernisation of existing dwelling-houses. I would like to express my regret at the rather discouraging little intimation at the foot of page (iv) of the Explanatory Memorandum, that it is only anticipated that a very limited amount of work will be done during the next two years. I appreciate that there are difficulties. The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mrs. Cullen) has pointed out that it is not desirable to divert materials for the reconstruction of old houses from those needed for building new houses which should have priority. I would not dissent from that, but I feel that it is, to some extent, possible to carry on both processes.
Before coming to Part II, I would like to say that I think the Government have

been wise in Part I in dropping the term "working-class" from the various housing Statutes. I remember three years ago, when we were discussing in Committee the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Bill, that there was considerable discussion on this point, and the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) suggested that it would be desirable to get rid of this term at an early date. The right hon. Gentleman who was then the Member for Gorbals, and who was Under-Secretary of State at that time, agreed with that view. He said that it was hoped that that step might be taken some time, and therefore we welcome the change made by this Bill. It should simplify the work of local authorities and, I think, be generally beneficial to the public.
So far as we who live in the cities and burghs of Scotland are concerned, I think that there is no doubt that the most important part of the Bill is that dealing with the reconditioning or improvement of existing dwellings. Undoubtedly, Part II does provide some machinery and some incentive to tackle this problem of the improvement of tenement property, but I am very much afraid that the inducement will not be sufficient to make the Bill the success which the Minister hopes it will be. That point was commented on by my hon. and gallant Friend who opened the discussion for the Opposition, and who pointed out the financial obstacles in the way of getting the work done.
For my own part, I regret that very much, because ever since I entered public life it has been my duty, first in the town council of Edinburgh and subsequently, in this House, to represent parts of the city where there are many miles of tenement property in varying degrees of habitability. I am afraid that today a good deal of that property is now decaying beyond repair. I have always regretted that this matter was not dealt with under the provisions of the 1935 Housing Act which, in the main, was based on the report of the Whitson Committee. Although the majority of the members of that Committee reported in favour of grants for reconditioning, there was a reservation against this by the hon. Member for Dunbartonshire (Mr. McKinlay), to which I fear too much attention was paid by the Government


of that time, with the result that no provisions were included in the statute for giving grants for reconditioning.
I would like to read paragraph 72 of the Report of the Whitson Committee. It says:
We therefore recommend, as a policy of limited duration, that financial assistance by way of lump sum grants should be given to owners of working-class houses in accordance with schemes to be prepared and administered by local authorities and approved by the Department of Health of Scotland, to enable owners to recondition their houses so as to attain, so far as possible, the standard of fitness and accommodation indicated in the code of by-laws that we have referred to in Part II.
I feel that it is unfortunate that that recommendation was not acted upon in the legislation which followed the presentation of that Report.
So far as the present Bill is concerned, I note that the main condition for eligibility for an improvement grant is that a dwelling house, after completion of the necessary work of improvement, will provide a proper standard of accommodation, as prescribed by the Secretary of State, for a period of not less than 30 years. I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman how he arrived at the figure of 30 years, because I think that the McTaggart Committee's Report, published in 1946 and referred to earlier in the Debate, specified 20 years and not 30 years. Reconditioning may be possible in a great many cases, but I feel that we all recognise that a lot of tenement property has become so decayed as to make it impossible to reconstruct, and that therefore a good deal of demolition work will undoubtedly be required in the big cities of Scotland. In so far as that work will clear away congested areas in those cities, that is a very good thing, as it will bring fresh air and sunshine into these badly crowded districts.
I do not, therefore, regret in any way the sweeping away of this old and bad property, but at the same time this will bring with it an additional problem in that we shall have to provide more and more new houses to replace those tenements. Moreover, the work of improvement will in itself bring about certain housing difficulties because we shall get the amalgamation of two existing houses to make one improved dwelling, and that will reduce the number of dwellings available for the people, although to some

extent this reduction may he offset by the splitting up and division of large houses into a number of units. I feel, however, that there are not so many of these large houses suitable in Scotland for that purpose as there are in England, and undoubtedly this policy of improvement will reduce very appreciably the number of houses available in existing tenement property. Incidentally, it seems to me that the actual work of improvement—the pouring of new wine into old bottles so to speak—will be attended with some of the difficulties which one associates with that process.
Among those difficulties will be the problem of how best to deal with the tenement which contains a dozen or more separate houses belonging to a variety of different people. I know that is a common occurrence from a scrutiny of the valuation roll in Edinburgh. There may be in a single tenement a dozen different proprietors. Some of the property may belong to owner-occupiers, some to living landlords and some to trust estates. It seems to me that dealing with all these various proprietors will be a matter of some difficulty. I think that the only solution in some cases will be to give the local authority the power to acquire the whole building and carry out the necessary work. I am not at all sure whether this can actually be done under the Bill. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would comment on that point. I mention it for the reason that it would seem from Clause 4 (2) that it is competent for the local authority to acquire land for the purposes of Part II of the Bill, but it is not quite clear whether it is competent for the local authority to acquire a tenement for the purpose of carrying out the work of reconstruction.

Mr. Woodburn: indicated assent.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: The right hon. Gentleman says it is. Well, that is satisfactory, because I know it is a matter which was exercising the minds of certain local authorities as well as some hon. Members. I am glad to hear that that difficulty is non-existent.
Another point of very considerable importance, to both local authorities and private individuals, concerns the liability to an imposition of a development charge under the Town and Country Planning Act in respect of any work of improve-


ment which may be carried out under Part II. I say this is of considerable importance, because within recent months hon. Members on all sides of the House have seen that considerable and unexpected difficulties arise out of the terms of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947. I myself think that to be one of the most unfortunate pieces of legislation ever passed by this House; it has been most successful in preserving the status quo and preventing anybody from doing anything to make improvements. If a development charge is to be imposed upon local authorities or private persons who are eligible to get these grants for improvement purposes, it will act as a deterrent in getting the necessary work done.
Another matter connected with tenement property which I wish to put to the Secretary of State concerns the type of tenement buildings with which he and I are very well acquainted, such as that on the Dairy Road and the Gorgie Road in Edinburgh, where there are large buildings with shops or business premises on the street level and various dwelling-houses above them. So far as I can see, the Bill does not take cognisance of this particular type of case. There does not seem to be any power to improve or recondition the shop premises, although it is perfectly competent to improve or recondition the dwelling-house premises above the shops.
That does not seem to me an altogether satisfactory state of affairs, because dwelling-houses may be amalgamated and improved under the terms of Part II, while underneath them, on the street level, there may be some old and rather grubby, and perhaps insanitary, shop premises. It would appear, desirable, therefore, that there should be power for the grants to extend over the whole building instead of having an artificial division between the shop on the street level and the dwelling-house above. Perhaps the Secretary of State would look into this and consider extending the scope of Clause 11 so as to cover that particular type of case, which has been brought to my attention by a local authority.
The only other thing I need say is to ask the Secretary of State about the labour and materials position, because I

am not certain—I do not think any hon. Member is—what the true position is. I have been told by one fairly authoritative source that sufficient materials and labour are available for beginning improvement work in a modest way as soon as this Bill becomes law. On the other hand, I have been warned by an equally authoritative source that to do work of improvement or reconditioning will have a delaying effect upon the construction of new houses. Frankly, I do not know the answer, because both the bodies whose advice I have sought are responsible bodies, and have given different opinions. I should like to know the official view of the Scottish Office, because while I am very anxious indeed to see improvement work carried out in tenement property, I know that the last thing that I or any hon. Member would want to see is the holding up of new building. Perhaps the Secretary of State will, when replying, give us an indication of the building labour and materials position.

7.55 p.m.

Mr. Willis: I was interested in the opening remarks of the hon. and gallant Member for West Edinburgh (Lieut.-Commander Hutchison), because he seemed to disagree with his hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pollok (Lieut.-Commander Galbraith) on Part I. The hon. and gallant Member for West Edinburgh welcomed Part I, whereas his hon. and gallant Friend tended to condemn it—and to condemn it on a rather peculiar ground.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman misunderstood me. What I welcomed was the dropping of the term "working class." I was not referring to any other class.

Mr. Willis: The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok condemned Part I on the ground that, according to him, it introduced the principle of people not so well off paying for housing accommodation for people who were better off. That, of course, has been a principle of Housing Acts for a long time past; it is not a new principle. The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok—who I am sorry is not here at the moment—went on to tell us that the Opposition would devise Amendments to draw a dividing line. This will be a very interesting experiment on the part of the Opposition—endeavouring to frame Amendments to


draw a dividing line to prevent the not so well off from contributing to the housing of people who are better off. I, for one, shall be rather interested to see the outcome of this experiment.
The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok went on to say—and I think he said this because the municipal elections are ahead—that we should not extend the sphere of our local authority housing activities, but that we should give the private builder a chance; and he suggested that if the private builder got a chance we could get thousands more houses. Well, really, this argument does not stand much examination. One of the reasons we cannot get more houses is, as I understand it, because of the limitation of materials, and whether local authority methods or private enterprise methods are used, given the same amount of material we shall get the same number of houses. I cannot see how we can get more pints out of a gallon than there are pints in a gallon. The argument to which we have been subjected tonight is quite false. I ventured to interrupt the hon. and gallant Member to indicate that there is nothing to prevent private enterprise from showing its mettle now. I should like to see private enterprise showing its mettle in Edinburgh.

Sir W. Darling: Is it not within the recollection of the hon. Gentleman that when I was trying to construct three houses, he raised difficulties in this House, and asked Questions on why I was being allowed to build those houses?

Mr. Willis: I am coming to that later on. In Edinburgh we have had houses under construction since 1945, being built by a private enterprise company which has received every form of assistance from the Government, who have supplied them with equipment, factory accommodation, and goodness,knows what. The houses they commenced in 1945 are still not finished. If private enterprise wants to claim to be the best medium for building houses, let it demonstrate that it can build houses quickly.
I represent a Division to which Part II of the Bill applies rather considerably, and in which property has been subdivided to form some of the worst slums in the City of Edinburgh. I think it contains more one-apartment houses as a result of these sub-divisions, than any part of Edinburgh. The hon. Member for

South Edinburgh has been active in subdividing houses in a different manner.

Sir W. Darling: Yes, to provide houses.

Mr. Willis: The first point I want to make about this activity is that it has been a profitable activity, and that thousands of pounds have been made out of the creation of these slums. The global rental charged for these one-apartment slums is greater than the rental before sub-division took place. This exploitation has gone on irrespective of the welfare of the city of Edinburgh. On the other hand, we have houses being divided into flats which is also a very profitable activity.

Colonel Hutchison: If the hon. Member thinks it is so profitable, will he accept my offer to give him houses in Glasgow free?

Mr. Willis: If the hon. and gallant Member doubts me, let him ask his hon. Friend the Member for South Edinburgh who actually formed a private company for the purpose of exploiting this particular activity. That is where he will get his information.

Sir W. Darling: I must take exception to the word "exploitation." There is no question of exploitation. The houses I sub-divided in the hon. Member's area were sold for £1,250 and more.

Mr. Willis: I am using the word "exploitation" in its economic sense. The hon. Member was developing something to fill a need, although I have no doubt that he wanted to fill some other need as well, which accounts for his very prosperous appearance today. That brings me to the point I want to put. Is it possible for the activities of the company of the hon. Member for South Edinburgh to be financed by the Government under the terms of this Bill? I can see no reason why it should not be financed by the Government, provided the terms are accepted. It is true that the local authority will fix the rents, but with the local authority we have in Edinburgh at the present time, I do not know that that is a very great safeguard. I have heard no reason why public funds should be used for the purpose of reconditioning and converting private property. I believe that this should be done under the local authorities.
When the McTaggart Committee inquired into this question and published their Report, we found two most important reservations to it—one signed by six members of the Committee and the other signed by two members of the Committee. Both recommended this; and I agree with them. I cannot see why private owners should be given this facility. I should have thought that in cases where owners are able to afford to pay, there is no need for assistance. The interesting thing is that we have been fighting the suggestion of a means test on another Bill and there is no means test in this Bill. A man can be worth a large amount of money and yet receive assistance to bring his property up to date. That is quite unnecessary and is unjustifiable. If the Report of the Committee is to be accepted, together with this Bill, it is likely to result in an expenditure over a period of years of £120 million, less £30 million which the owners will pay. I cannot see that there is any justification for spending this money in reconditioning the property of private individuals.
There is also the question of labour. We have been told that our housing programme is held up at the present time for lack of men in the finishing trades, plasterers, joiners and that type of labour, and that is precisely the type of labour that will be used under this Bill. One of the reservations in the Committee's Report pointed out this difficulty; that unless the whole field of activity is brought under the aegis of the local authorities, there will be a problem arising in regard to labour. I hope we shall be told what steps my right hon. Friend proposes to take to ensure that that position does not arise. If we are to spend public money on the reconditioning of private property, then the local authorities should have a say in who is to be the tenant. In other words, the property should become available to be filled from the housing lists of the local authorities. Nothing is said about that in Clause 11, and it is a matter that ought to be put right.
Among the miscellaneous provisions is one that I welcome. That is the increase in the amount which can be borrowed under the Small Dwellings Acquisition Acts. I asked a Question about this some time ago, and I was

interested to notice that between December, 1938, and December, 1947, only 50 loans had been made under these Acts. It is true that the war years intervened, but it is also true that there was considerable activity in the selling of houses at the end of the war. Why was it that only 50 people availed themselves of these provisions, which are of considerable benefit inasmuch as they save a considerable amount of interest as compared with borrowing from building societies? I suggest that the first reason is due to the fact that prices were high and the amount allowed insufficient. I welcome, therefore, the increase up to £5,000.
The second reason why these facilities were not used was due to the fact that they were unknown to many of the people buying houses at the end of the war. Many of these people were young ex-Service men, who had just been married, and they were astonished when I told some of them, in Edinburgh, what provisions were open to them. I ask my right hon. Friend to ensure that these provisions will be given as much publicity as possible, because they effect a considerable saving to those who will take advantage of them. In conclusion, I welcome the Bill because I see its possibilities, although that welcome is qualified by the defects which I have pointed out. I hope that we shall look at some of those defects on the Committee stage.

8.11 p.m.

Mr. McFarlane: I hope the hon. Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) will forgive me if I do not follow him in some of the points he has made. Instead I shall at once refer to the speech of the Under-Secretary, who opened the Debate. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that I listened to him with the closest attention, though with no little disappointment. I will grant him everything, even his peroration, but I think he will agree that it is an essential condition of that human happiness of which he spoke, that in Scotland we should have at least some approximation to the idea of a separate dwelling for every family. This Bill contains many desirable and unexceptionable features, but I believe that it will be judged in Scotland according to the prospect it affords of securing additional units of accommodation. In Glasgow, at least, it is only by that standard that the Bill will be judged.
There is one very fundamental difference in the approach of the Under-Secretary to this Bill from that of the Minister of Health in proposing a similar Measure for England and Wales a short time ago. The Under-Secretary said today, in justification for the Bill, that the time was now ripe. The Minister of Health was at great pains to prove that the time was opportune on the basis of his achievements in England and Wales. The right hon. Gentleman said that we had made good the position of 1939, that we had reached the position where the country enjoyed more actual separate habitations than ever before, that we were within sight of providing a separate dwelling for every family, and that this was the time to make a fresh advance based on those achievements. I have no doubt that if those claims are well founded, this is the time to undertake the valuable work of conversion. There is no question about the fact that Scotland has in its buildings a structural stability which has outlived their internal deficiencies.
In my view, however, I do not believe that the time has arrived to put the provisions of this Bill into practice in Scotland. After all, we ought to have some standard such as that upon which the Minister of Health based his Bill for England and Wales. I suggest that we should make a brief comparison with the position in England and Wales. According to the Housing Returns for the year ended December, 1948, 271,585 permanent houses were provided by local authorities in England and Wales and 34,885 were provided in Scotland—which approximates to the traditional one-eighth relationship between England and Scotland. Taking into account the fact, however, that 76,765 houses were provided by private builders in England and 3,344 were provided in Scotland, it will be seen that we fell considerably below the one-eighth.

Mr. Gallacher: There was a much greater need in Scotland than England.

Mr. McFarlane: That is precisely the point I wish to make. We must recognise the greater need in Scotland. I believe that that greater need was properly expressed in the allocation of the temporary programme. Scotland

was given a greater proportion than England in view of that need. In my opinion, it is self-evident, from this comparison, that the pressure for new building and the provision of more units of accommodation in Scotland is still undiminished. I concede to Members opposite all the advantages of the Bill, but I can foresee the danger of dissipating the energies of local authorities from their main and paramount duty, which has not yet been carried out.
As do many Members on this side of the House, I welcome the provision to secure a certain amount of private enterprise help in making conversions and sub-divisions. There is no doubt that we could with great advantage enlist the support of private effort in this direction. I cannot, however, understand the attitude of the Government in ignoring, as they do, the implications of our rating system. The property owner who enters upon this scheme for conversion is placed relatively at a disadvantage compared with the property owner in England. The whole conception of the Bill is nullified. I am reluctant to follow my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) in suggesting that this is deliberate, though it seems that such a suggestion can hardly be avoided. The hon. Member for Rutherglen (Mr. McAllister) accepted the proposition that we must attack our rating system and the Rent Restrictions Act. Such an attack would have very serious consequences, but surely we can say that in so far as the Bill makes an attempt to enlist private enterprise effort in carrying out conversions it might at least recognise the incidence of our rating system. If that is ignored, the whole of the proposals of the Bill relative to private assistance will be nullified.
As I have already said, this House must have regard to the capacity of local authorities before further responsibilities are heaped upon them. I have the greatest doubt about the position of Glasgow now, and I hope that hon. Members will at least spare me any sneers of making this statement with an eye on the forthcoming municipal elections. In the Housing Survey to which I have already referred, 34,885 permanent houses have been built in Scotland since the end of the war, to the great satisfaction of hon. Members opposite. In so far as rhythm


and ratio between houses in course of construction and houses erected has greatly improved recently, I congratulate the Secretary of State for Scotland.
The point I want to make relative to Glasgow is that, of the permanent houses erected since the end of the war, 5,623 were erected in Glasgow. About 2,000 of them were of the non-traditional type. Glasgow received 2,500 temporary houses out of an allocation of 32,000 for Scotland. This was a matter of deliberate policy on the part of the local authority in Glasgow. If we add the permanent and temporary houses available in Scotland since the war ended, in order to get the units of accommodation, we find that the total is 66,000 and this great city—

Mr. Hoy: No.

Mr. McFarlane: I think I am correct. I have been faithfully following the statistics provided. Since the war ended 34,885 permanent houses were erected in Scotland. To that I have added 32,000 temporary houses to make a figure of 66,000, and of that total Glasgow received 5,623 permanent houses and 2,500 temporary houses. In other words, this great city, which contains something between a fifth and a quarter of the entire population of Scotland, received only 8,000 units of accommodation since the end of the war. We are thinking of putting more responsibility upon local authorities in regard to housing, but surely a record like that is sufficient to make this House think twice before it does anything which would in any way prevent the Glasgow Corporation from facing up to such an appalling deficiency.
I was astonished at the whole tone of the speech of the Joint Under-Secretary of State. He seemed to assume that in such a condition we could supply baths and all the rest of it—however desirable these things may be. The whole tone of his speech was based on improvements. I do not want to say that my experience is in any way unique. It is shared by every Member of this House who shares with me the representation of the City of Glasgow. At the present juncture there are 40,000 homeless people in Glasgow and one of the most bitter experiences of any Member is to meet these constituents and realise the tragedy of hopeless frustration.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: It has accumulated.

Mr. McFarlane: This is something which has to be dealt with first, before we proceed with the provisions of this Bill.

8.27 p.m.

Mr. William Ross: I can well understand the passion and sincerity with which the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. McFarlane) spoke when he envisaged the suffering that is experienced in Glasgow today. Surely he will answer frankly, as answer he must, the question whether the suffering started only in the year 1945.

Colonel Hutchison: Is the hon. Member aware that we have suffered from a Socialist corporation in Glasgow since 1933, and a lot of it started that year.

Mr. Ross: The hon. and gallant Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel Hutchison) must realise that it does not matter how progressive a local authority is, unless it gets Acts of Parliament by which it can get on with the job, it can do nothing. All the years before the war we had here a good old Tory Government.

Mr. Snadden: Tell us the old, old story.

Mr. Ross: It may be an old story, but it is a. sad one for the people of Scotland. The hon. Member for Camlachie spoke of the problem of Scotland as compared with England. The two are not comparable at all. Committees, commissions and what not, have sat on this business. I would refer him to the first monumental report on this subject, that of the Royal Commission of 1917, which stated that if the standard of housing condition applicable to England were applied and enforced in Scotland, 690,000 people would be homeless. There was no Socialist Administration in those days. The same report by this Royal Commission stated clearly that the failure was the failure of private enterprise to provide housing for the people of Scotland. That was why, after the war, we got started with subsidised housing.
I listened to the remarks of the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) on this question of taking the term "working class" out of


the Bill. So far as I can see, it is only bringing the law into line with actual practice, because I can remember the first local authority houses which went up in the burghs of Ayrshire. They were not working-class people who were in them. The hon. and gallant Member talks about poor people having to subsidise richer people, through subsidies for housing. It should be remembered, however, that the working classes of Scotland could not afford to pay rent for these houses. I can well remember what happened in one area, because later on I myself went to live there. It was inhabited by teachers, bankers, and black-coated workers. Tonight we have had spurious indignation from the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok over something that has existed since the year 1919. His voice has been still for all these years. He suddenly decides now to vent his indignation.
The hon. Member for Camlachie spoke about the timeliness of the Bill. He seemed to think that my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland was wrong in saying that the time was now ripe. He suggested that it was not yet. There must be something wrong in the ranks of the Conservatives. When this Bill was first published, "The Scotsman" interviewed Mr. Murray McGregor, the Secretary of the Property Owners' and Factors' Association of Glasgow, who had this to say:
If the houses were modernised, as they should be, they would have a useful life of many years.
The same newspaper, which evidently does not mind receiving anonymous reports so long as they are anti-Government, carries this opinion from the director of a large local firm of house factors:
The problem should have been tackled long ago, when building costs were lower and more labour was available.
That is what official Conservatives have to say about it in their property-owning associations.
The point is that they are quite correct. The 1933 Whitson Report unveiled the serious conditions existing, and suggested that the Government should do something about it. Hon. and right hon. Gentlemen cannot sit smugly on those benches and criticise the present Government without realising that they had the opportunity, under the 1935 Act for Scotland, and that they completely ignored it.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman surely will admit that in 1935 we were very busily engaged in trying to prepare the country for what was coming in 1939.

Mr. Ross: I wish that were true. I can remember an army going into France, a British Army, and walking back defeated because they had not the stuff that the hon. and gallant Member says we were preparing in 1935.

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: Who voted against rearmament?

Mr. Ross: That will not wash. It was the Government of the day that had all the responsibility. The present Bill is very much overdue. I think the Government's behaviour in bringing it in now is commendable, especially as circumstances are all against it because of the position in regard to labour and materials and the overriding priority of new housing. At the same time, we must recognise that unless we put in the enabling powers, and get on with the preparations to tackle the question, we shall never get the increased standards of housing and of health in Scotland that we so much need. It is all very well to talk about analgesia; the thing that is required in Scotland today is decent housing conditions, in which mothers can bring up their children.
In the present conditions, one house in every three in Scotland is sub-standard. I can assure hon. Members that the standard to which they are related is not high. The McTaggart Report set that standard as a decent water supply and individual sanitary conveniences. There was no mention of a bath. Surely in 1949 we cannot talk, as the hon. Member for Camlachie did, about a bath being a luxury It is the fact that in Scotland today there are whole areas, not just streets, in our towns that are without a single bath. If we took that standard, we should find that a greater proportion than one in three of our houses would be sub-standard. We cannot afford to ignore the facts. Housewives in Scotland, in homes with a sink in front of the window, the recess bed and the old-fashioned grates on which they spend hours of drudgery—it may be all very well for the Front Bench to


laugh but it is no laughing matter for the people of Scotland to endure it.

The Lord Advocate (Mr. John Wheatley): Which Front Bench?

Mr. Ross: The Opposition Front Bench I mean. The people of Scotland are not laughing.

Commander Galbraith: The hon. Gentleman is accusing me, and my hon. Friends sitting beside me, of laughing. We were laughing for a very good reason and not at the people of Scotland. I will tell the hon. Gentleman the reason, if he wishes to know it.

Mr. Ross: I should very much like to hear it.

Commander Galbraith: The story I was telling to my hon. Friends was one of considerable interest to him. It related to baths. It was a conversation which I had some years ago with a forester of over 80 years of age on Loch Lomond side. I asked him how he got on in his youth with regard to washing facilities, and he pointed across the valley to a large house and said, "That is Buchanan Castle. The Duke of Montrose lives there. He has 100 bedrooms and one bathroom. We had four rooms and the burn. Who was better off?"

Mr. Ross: I have regal precedent for saying, "We are not amused." The hon. and gallant Gentleman should do what hon. Gentlemen on this side did when he was speaking, listen to the person who is addressing the House.

Commander Galbraith: I shall be delighted to do so, but the hon. Gentleman referred to me and my hon. Friend, and I have a right to reply to him.

Mr. Ross: I do not disagree with that, but if the hon. and gallant Gentleman wishes to relate stories about baths to his hon. Friend, he can do it elsewhere.
The Secretary of State gave a recital of really damning statistics which at the very best, cause irritation and frustration to the Scottish housewives and at the worst absolute human misery. However, the urgency of getting down to this problem is something which makes me even welcome this Bill, though I am not

ecstatically enthusiastic about its provisions. The difficulty is that we have 300,000 to 400,000 houses in Scotland which are sub-standard and practically all of them belong to private property owners. That is the crux of the problem. We have rooted objections to handing over public money to private owners to perpetuate their own interest in those buildings.

Colonel Hutchison: That is being done under the Bill.

Mr. Ross: That may be in the Bill but the Bill has not yet passed through this House and so we are not yet doing it. The sole complaint of the hon. Member for Central Aberdeen (Mr. Spence) was that we had stopped doing it in relation to the tied house. The point is that we have that rooted objection, and I consider that we are entitled to have that principle plainly laid before the House tonight, just as it was in the minority Report by two differing sections of the Committee. The dilapidations and the lack of up-to-dateness of the houses which are the subject of our consideration should have been tackled by the property-owners themselves, but they failed to do so for so many years. It is not right that they should now expect the taxpayers and the ratepayers to come to their aid, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) suggested, without any question whether they are financially able to undertake the work themselves.
The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok was concerned about spending Government money for people who did not really require it, and who could do something for themselves, but he did not apply that to property-owners and owner-occupiers who are financially able to modernise their own property. If he had been logical, he should have carried his theme right through the criticism of the Bill, but his failure to do that, to my mind, was very noticeable indeed. If the Government are depending on these private owners to put this matter right, I am afraid they are backing the wrong horse. If they are depending on the social responsibility and the public spirit of the private property-owners of Scotland, nothing at all will be done in the matter.

Colonel Hutchison: Would the hon. Member do it?

Mr. Ross: I am talking about the private property-owners, the Bill as I see it, and the reactions of hon. Gentlemen opposite in their various utterances.

Colonel Hutchison: I asked, would the hon. Gentleman do it? Because I have offered a house to two hon. Members already, and I will arrange for him to have the house free, if he is prepared to do it.

Mr. Ross: All that I can suggest is that the hon. and gallant Member should offer it to the Glasgow Corporation and let them consider it.

Colonel Hutchison: They will not do it.

Mr. Ross: I know they will not.

Sir W. Darling: They do not do anything about it.

Mr. Ross: The piece of property about which the hon. and gallant Member is concerned will not be covered by this Bill, as I hope a great many of the tenements of Scotland, particularly in the Gorbals, will not be covered, because we will not waste public money on buildings of that nature. They must come down. We will not get the response from the property owners, and I have a feeling that the Bill as it stands will not meet the needs of Scotland. The hon. and gallant Member and another hon. Member referred to the fact that a 6 per cent. rise in rent was not nearly enough. If he looks at the Report, he will see that an even higher grant was being given by the Government, and it was suggested that they would get an 8 per cent. rise in rent—

Colonel Hutchison: Eight per cent. on the money expended.

Mr. Ross: I presumed that hon. Gentlemen had read the Report and would appreciate that point. If the hon. and gallant Gentleman looks at the back of the Report he will find another interim recommendation from Mr. Murray McGregor of the Glasgow Property Owners Association, stating that eight per cent. on that grant was still not enough. Looking at the Bill, and realising the power that lies within these landlords to make or mar the Bill, we must realise that nothing will be done. To my mind the only people who will be able properly to tackle this job will be the local authorities.

Sir W. Darling: Why?

Mr. Ross: The hon. and gallant Member for Perth (Colonel Gomme-Duncan) does not seem to object to property-owners getting ratepayers' or taxpayers' money, but surely he should have no objection at all to that being spent by the democratic representatives of the people, the local authorities? They have all the planning powers necessary, they have compulsory purchase powers and, financed by the Government, they could make something of this job. But the Secretary of State has stressed in this respect that he has only empowered local authorities to do the task; he has not laid on them any obligation to carry on with it. It means that any local authority which likes, can ignore the Bill, and have no trouble at all from Edinburgh—

Sir W. Darling: Or Glasgow.

Mr. Ross: I was referring to St. Andrew's House, the Department of Health in Edinburgh. What is necessary is what the McTaggart Committee suggested in paragraphs 151–154, that full responsibility should be laid on local authorities to prepare schemes now, to consider which areas and which houses in those areas could properly be dealt with under a modernisation scheme, and then, in the fullness of time, to go ahead with the actual work; but to leave the position as it is at present, with the local authorities not obliged to do anything, will achieve nothing. I remember what happened under the Housing (Rural Workers) (Scotland) Act, the workings of which were reported upon in 1937. That point was covered also by the McTaggart Committee. They found that local authorities were not carrying out their duties; that money was being wasted on houses that were not worth repairing. We found in Ayr County after 1937, when the responsibilities were acted upon and when conditions were tightened up, that the farmers' interest in modernising tied houses suddenly disappeared. We should strengthen the hands of the local authorities—[Interruption.]—I am referring now to Ayrshire—

Mr. Snadden: I am very doubtful.

Mr. Ross: The hon. Member is very doubtful, but I could take him to a number of tied houses which would shame him. The point is that unless local


authorities are obliged to take action, nothing may be done, and I suggest that this aspect should be reconsidered by the Joint Under-Secretary. This is an urgent task. We must get down to the actual preparation of the attack and in the meantime we should ensure that there is no interference with the permanent housing programme. Do not let us forget that this is the hard core of social housing unrest in Scotland. It is not good enough merely to pass an enabling Bill and then not to take steps to ensure that effect is given to it. As time goes on, these conditions become worse. Our housing standards are a disgrace to Scotland, and they are a disgrace to us if we allow them to persist.

8.47 p.m.

Mr. Maclay: The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) covered a surprising amount of ground and did the thing which always happens in these Debates. He went back over old history, accusing hon. Members on this side of being smug, and made all sorts of general accusations of what happened or did not happen between the wars. I am no expert on housing in detail—I say that straight away—and one thing I have learned today and in other housing Debates to which I have listened is that anyone who turns to figures is asking for trouble, because invariably like is compared with unlike. The three years after the 1918 war were in no way comparable with the three years after the last war—the background behind them was in no way similar; yet these figures get quoted again and again, right, left and centre. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman quoted those particular figures—

Mr. Ross: I did not.

Mr. Maclay: The hon. Member was talking quite a lot about the failure to do certain things between the wars and must have been tempted to go into those figures.

Mr. Ross: I was suggesting that the problem should have been tackled, and I quoted the Secretary of the Glasgow Property Owners. Surely, the hon. Gentleman does not deny that nothing at all was done with this particular problem.

Mr. Maclay: On that particular problem, I am not going to argue with the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Ross: But that is the point under discussion.

Mr. Maclay: I, for one, do not think that anything like enough was done on housing between the wars. A great deal more should, and could, have been done, but I consider that in effect a great deal more was done than has actually been achieved in existing circumstances by the present Government. I have some excellent figures here, but I am nervous of housing figures. They do not appear to coincide with any other figures which anybody has used this afternoon, so I shall not use them.

Mr. Ross: The hon. Member should not do what he advises everyone else not to do.

Mr. Maclay: I said that I am not going to use them. But what I do say about them is that they compare quite deplorably—I make no apology for introducing this into the Debate—with the fantastic statements made by very responsible gentlemen—or right hon. Gentlemen who should have been responsible—at the time of the General Election, when they definitely misled the electorate with talk of 4 million houses in 10 years being nothing like good enough. They said that the houses must be built in much less time than that. How do their figures stand up to the test? How do the figures stand up to the statement that the problem could be solved in two weeks? I get sick and tired of this Government claiming credit for things they have done, while, if one gets hold of the election addresses of 1945, one finds that these tell a very different story compared with actual achievements. I am willing to give way to the hon. Member for Leith (Mr. Hoy) if he wants to make a comment.

Mr. Gallacher: There is no difference between Tories and Liberal Nationals.

Mr. Maclay: I always try to be courteous to the other side. Hon. Member will realise that I intensely dislike being controversial in Debate, but occasionally it seems necessary, on a subject like this, to put a sense of perspective into the discussion. Of course I welcome a great deal of this Bill. Any hon. Member, whether an expert on the Housing Acts, or not, is bound to know from experience in his constituency of the


desperate tragedy—it is nothing less—caused through the failure of the people of all ages, young married couples and elderly people, to get housing accommodation. I find it the most tragic single thing in all my constituency work. One can do nothing to help these people, but if certain parts of the Bill help to solve the problem in any way, we are bound to welcome those parts of the Bill.
I have great difficulty in understanding the Scottish Housing Acts. A good many offers have been going round this evening. An offer was made by the hon. and gallant Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison) which was not taken up. I make another offer, that if any hon. Member can take me away for an hour and explain to me in that hour exactly the operations of all the Housing Acts under which we are working today and the Rent Restrictions Acts and will throw in, for good measure, the Town and Country Planning Act and how it affects this Bill, I should be inordinately grateful and would at least stand him a cup of tea. If he would throw in a reasonably accurate explanation of how the Scottish rating problem can be solved, I would go a good deal further.
In no controversial spirit, I suggest that the time of the Government might have been better occupied during these three or four years if they had got on to the task of tidying up the whole housing mess, because it is a confused, tantalising and exasperating mess. If they had kept off some of the Bills which have contributed nothing but trouble to this country, it would have been a helpful thing. One gives blessing to those parts of the Bill which may improve the situation and I sincerely hope that the fears of the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) will not be realised but that it will be found possible to get on, to some extent, with the improvement of a lot of houses and flats which are desperately in need of improvement and could be made habitable without much work.
Even in this part of the Bill, there are a good many points which will need clearing up in Committee. I have been puzzling over the Bill and I am wondering whether under the Town and Country Planning Act a development charge could be made for "improvement" as contemplated in this Bill. I have tried to puzzle out whether

a development charge could arise in relation to any improvement under the appropriate part of the Bill. One can find quite a lot of other problems which might arise out of planning.

Mr. McAllister: It was made clear that where a large house is converted, no development charge arises, as there is no alteration in the cubic content.

Mr. Maclay: I know that is in the Schedule to the Town and Country Planning Act, but already I have had this question asked by a town clerk and I am not satisfied that that provision covered all possibilities of improvement which might arise. If we are to get anywhere quickly with this Bill, if it becomes law, these fears in relation to the Town and Country Planning Act must be removed. Hon. Members know that the effect of the Town and Country Planning Act in its present form is to cause hopeless confusion, which is holding up development in all parts of the country.

Commander Galbraith: Could my hon. Friend say, from the inquiries which he has made, whether a development charge operates when four houses are converted into two?

Mr. Maclay: No. That question has me completely beaten. I should not attempt to answer it.

Sir W. Darling: And after change of use?

Mr. Maclay: This could become a fascinating discussion of the interpretation of the Town and Country Planning Act. All I suggested, tentatively and nervously, was that whoever is to wind up the Debate, should clear up all the doubts that are in our minds on this subject, and that I would then take him out and give him a cup of coffee at once.
Another problem could arise under general planning schemes. I admit that this is rather a Committee point but it should be mentioned at this stage. Will a local authority be prevented from going ahead enthusiastically with improvement grants under this Bill because of the fear that, say, in the case of a house in respect of which they made a grant on the basis of 10 years' life, that house might be due to be demolished when the time came for a development plan to he implemented? Obviously, difficulties could arise in that respect because an


owner might have to pay 50 per cent. of the cost and the local authority the other 50 per cent. What about compensation to the owner when that plan is finally implemented and the house is demolished in the implementation of that plan? This is a small Committee point, but it might be rather serious if it deterred local authorities from using this Bill in the best possible way, because they were frightened of stirring up trouble for themselves in the long run, if the time came for compulsory acquisition under a planning scheme.
I turn to the part of the Bill which deals with laundries, furniture and grants and loans to individuals and others. It is essential to consider this part of the Bill against the background of the Economic Survey for this year and the Chancellor's Budget speech, the whole emphasis being on economy wherever economy is possible, not only in cash but above all in man-power. We must get the maximum man-power into productive enterprise. I do not apologise for reminding the House of the figures which Members will find in this year's Economic Survey showing the increase in the number of employees in local government service. The total figures for the Civil Service, other Government employees and local authority employees are terrifying. The figures have been used in many other Debates but they are relevant to this one.
The Civil Service proper, other national Government employees and local government employees have increased from 1,465,000 in the middle of 1939 to 2,230,000 by the end of 1948. The increase in the case of local government is from 846,000 to 1,146,000. But that is not all about local government manpower. From the end of 1947 to the end of 11948, the increase was from 1,105,000 to 1,146,000, an increase of 41,000. Here we came to the worst part of the whole story. That increase took place against an estimate in the Economic Survey for 1948 of a decrease of 30,000, so that employees of all kinds in local government service at the end of 1948 stood at a figure of 71,000 more than the planning Departments reckoned that they should, or hoped that they would, according to the various ways, in which they try to steer these things.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Would the hon. Member wish to reduce not only the number of administrative workers in the building industry but the number of building trade workers as well?

Mr. Maclay: I am just coming to my point. The point I am making relates to laundries, to the provision of furniture, to hostels and meals—about which I would speak on slightly different grounds—and certain other terms in this Bill which must be considered against the background of those staggering figures. I am not suggesting that if my proposals were fully accepted by the Government, they would mean a very large reduction in the vast increase of manpower employed by local authorities. But surely the whole lesson of the Debates since last Wednesday has been that in every direction, we must avoid duplication and extravagance in the use of manpower. I am not talking of cash at the moment, although actually in the end they amount to the same thing.
Here we have, quite gratuitously thrown into this Bill without any evidence that it will really help, the provision that the local authorities can provide laundry services. I go further than my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith). I do not think that the local authorities should be given an omnibus power to provide laundry services and just hold that power indefinitely to use how and when they think fit.

Sir W. Darling: Is not it right that local authorities sometimes require to wash dirty linen in public?

Mr. Maclay: I think they can always do that in the available resources of the locality in which they live. I would return now to my laundries rather than to the dirty linen relating to them. I wish to make a point which may seem a small one. People may feel that if we are to have these local authority housing schemes, we may as well provide laundries, and make a job of it. But is the thing necessary? Probably in every case there will be available a private firm which can provide a laundry service. If over a period they find such facilities are not provided local authorities can come and ask for special powers to provide the services as other local authorities have done in the past. That


would make sense; there is full provision for it and they would get a careful check of local public opinion. The same thing applies to hired furniture. That also is duplication. There are always a number of firms available and able to provide furniture on the hire purchase system. The same applies to allowing local authorities to become building societies. Such powers have existed in the past, and I too was proposing to ask why those powers have not been used before.

Mr. Ross: People did not know about them.

Mr. Maclay: There may be another explanation which may well be true, and that is, that people have found that building societies, with their expert knowledge, have been better at this job, and more helpful, than the local authorities.

Mr. Ross: There is the question of interest rates. The interest rate in Edinburgh has been quoted as 1 per cent. lower.

Mr. Maclay: Probably not 1 per cent., but threequarters of 1 per cent.

Mr. Ross: Three-and-a-half per cent.

Mr. Maclay: Something like that. There must be some explanation of why this service has not been used. I can assure the hon. Member that if I had been looking for such financial accommodation, I most certainly would have discovered that that facility was available, as would most people if they wanted finance for building houses.
The whole tenor of my complaint is that in a Bill containing many useful things, we are putting in all these extra powers, which may be quite nice things in themselves, but which are not essential to the working of this Bill. They are duplications of existing facilities. There is provision available, and local authorities cannot provide efficient services of this kind. In fact, as hon. Members will have noticed in the newspapers last week, we have just had a case of a local authority a very few miles away from here, who had a little trouble over wireless sets. I am not imputing any wrong motives. I am merely quoting from a report when I say that they were unable to keep track of the wireless sets with which they were

dealing, and the auditor had to make careful inquiries. Eighteen sets had disappeared. They were traced after some time. Four radiograms were not accounted for. The cost was only £552, but that whole report was frightening. Here was a local authority playing about with the provision of wireless sets rejoicing in the beautiful name of "Civic Concord." One of the missing sets ended up, very properly I think, in the mayor's parlour. I make no complaint about that. The director of a business ought to have an example of his product available for his visitors to see, and he generally does.
But really, is it sense that a local authority should dabble in the peddling of wirelesses and furniture? It is not a local authority function. The local authority will not do it more efficiently. Cannot we cut this kind of nonsense out of the Bill, or is it merely another part of the process of Socialism which wants to put more and more power into the hands of the local authority or the central Government? That is the only possible explanation. I do not believe that hon. Members opposite think that the local authority will perform these functions efficiently. I do not accept that even though the available facilities—

Miss Herbison: Does the hon. Gentleman apply these remarks to the provision of furniture as well as to laundries and so on?

Mr. Maclay: Yes, I do. It might be quite a nice thing for the local authority to have power to supply furniture, but it is a duplication.

Mrs. Jean Mann: Is it not the case that the party opposite agreed to furniture being supplied, and that it has been supplied continuously since 1925?

Mr. Maclay: Quite possibly, but that does not mean that I accept it for one second. I have no responsibility for what was done between the wars. I think it is nonsense, and I do not hesitate to say so. I am in disagreement with some hon. Members on this side on the question of laundry facilities. All I say is that on these matters I am in substantial agreement with the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok. If it becomes clear that the facilities are not available then, of course, the local authority, or


somebody, must provide them. There are perfectly good methods of procedure available which enable the local authority to get the power to do that.
I am sorry to emphasise this so much. I have gone away from the good part of the Bill to what I consider to be the quite unnecessary and really irritating part of it. These provisions are tucked in, like so many things that are done by this Government for no obvious reason except to push on with the Socialist theory. When I first read the Bill I thought, "This is splendid. At long last we have power given back to the local authorities." But what power is given to the local authorities? All these powers need the approval or authority of the Secretary of State. As I have said before, with no reflection on the existing or former Secretaries of State, I do not think that any man in that position should be allowed to have powers concentrated on him in the way that they are concentrated in the Secretary of State for Scotland at the moment. I, and a colleague of mine, have noticed that the Secretary of State is looking very tired. I would willingly help him to relieve himself of some of his future duties by putting down Amendments to remove the offensive provisions of this Bill.

9.8 p.m.

Miss Herbison: The hon. Member for Montrose Burghs (Mr. Maclay) seemed to be pained at the start of his speech that hon. Members on this side of the House, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross), should dare to have mentioned housing as it was between the wars. We find, time and again, that if any mention whatever is made of what I would say were the sins of omission of hon. Members opposite, there is jeering and pained expressions. One of the reasons why this Bill is important is because of that lack of real work by hon. Members opposite for the provision of houses for the workers.
I am surprised at the mixed reception this Bill has received, and at what I would term the niggling, narking gratitude of the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith). When he was dealing with certain provisions of the Bill, it seemed to me that he could find nothing good in it. He also referred

to the housing progress in this country since the end of the war; and the hon. Member for Montrose said that the two periods were not comparable—that is to say, the first three years after the First World War and the first three years after the Second World War. I agree that these two periods are not comparable; but I should say that that is another hit against the Opposition.

Mr. Maclay: I said I was bored with this kind of argument. I do not want to be insulting to the hon. Lady; of course, I am not for one second bored by her speech—but I am bored by this endless argument about who built what and when and where, when we are desperately short of houses at this moment and ought to be getting on with the job. I accept the hon. Lady's contention that Opposition Members have made these charges; but I think most of them have come from the Government side.

Miss Herbison: I agree; but in the first instance the charges came from the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok, and it is only right that my hon. Friends should answer them.
In giving a welcome to this Bill I feel that its provisions should lead to more houses being provided more quickly for many of our people. Indeed, in Scotland, in spite of what I consider the very good house building record during the past three and a half years, there are still far too many people living as sub-tenants, and far too many people living in houses with no modern conveniences—houses which ought to have been condemned, not three years, or even ten years ago, but in my constituency, and in Glasgow, 20 years ago. I contend that one of the greatest factors which contributes to the happiness of a family is a good house. I would never say that merely having a good house inevitably meant a happy family; but I would contend most strongly that many families have been made miserable, and many tragedies have come to families, because they have had to live in the awful conditions, in which many of our people in Scotland are still living.
I want to touch for a moment on the provisions of Clause 8, which permits grants to persons other than local authorities for the improvement of housing accommodation. A number of my con-


stituents own their own houses; not big houses, but houses which the owners would have liked to make more modern and more comfortable. They found it impossible to do so because of the lack of money. I am delighted to find that because of this Bill a number of my constituents will be able to make homes which are not too bad at the present time, very much better for their families. There is one thing which worries me. Under Clause 8 there is provision for the owner of property to have help; in other words, an owner who has a tenement and wishes to have help under this Bill may get it. I think that is a good thing; but there must be attached to it certain conditions which are not attached at the present time.
At the beginning of the Debate there was some argument about whether we should build all our houses for letting, as the Scottish Office has insisted should be done for some time, or whether we should allow a number of houses to be built by private enterprise for sale. We have always taken the attitude that the person who had the greatest need ought to have the house first. It is because of our belief in that, that we have stuck closely to this point during most of the last three and a half years, of building houses for letting and not houses for selling.
The problem I want to put before the Secretary of State is this. Under this Bill a private owner may have grants to improve his property. A private owner, if one of his houses becomes vacant at the present time, can let that house to any person. I feel that we are not carrying out the policy in which we believe—the policy that every house that is vacant goes to the family with the greatest need —if we do not lay down as one condition of a grant, that if a person is willing to accept the grant, vacant houses ought to be allocated by the local authority. As Socialists we have gone a long way in this Bill; I agree with some of my hon. Friends that it is against Socialist policy to give grants to private persons for reconditioning their property. If that additional condition is accepted during the Committee stage, then I think that many of my hon. Friends who have qualms and are worried about public money being given to private owners, may be able to overcome these qualms.
In my own constituency, apart from the houses owned by the local authorities, it would be safe to say that the majority of the houses are owned by the National Coal Board. The National Coal Board took over not only a bankrupt industry but some of the worst slums in Scotland. For some time in many of our mining villages, particularly in Lanarkshire, it is going to be difficult to find new houses for these people. As far as I can see, what applies to agricultural workers' cottages will also apply to the houses owned by the National Coal Board under this Bill they will be regarded as service houses. That means that, on the one hand, we are perfectly willing to give money to private owners who may let their houses to anyone, and, on the other hand, not to give money to a big concern like the National Coal Board to help it provide better houses for its workers.
The last point I want to make is on hostels. In the Report of the Scottish Housing Advisory Committee there is a paragraph dealing with what are called "service flats." Many of the friends with whom I have worked in Glasgow, live in these service flats. I agree very much with this Report, which says that there is very little service and that sometimes the rents are exorbitant. Many business girls, apart from teachers, who do not even today have very big salaries, find that they have to use far too large a proportion of their salaries to pay rent for these so-called service flats. I welcome very much the provision in the Bill enabling local authorities to build hostels for this type of person. I hope that they will use some imagination. I hope that these hostels will not be barrack-like buildings but will have some beauty. The hon. Member for Montrose Burghs (Mr. Maclay) was worried lest much more work would be put on local authorities, and involving a greater number of staff. I agree that we have to be very careful at the present time in regard to the use of manpower.
On the question of furniture, I have been in houses in which there was a family of young children, with only the father working. In those houses I have seen furniture sufficient only for one room. I am certain that this Bill was meant to cover such families—people who are being moved from old slum property to new council houses. They will


be given the chance of getting furniture and paying for it monthly or quarterly on their rent. That seems a much better method than the old method of having furniture on hire purchase, and being given a certain number of years in which to pay for it. Many had to pay for furniture with money which they ought to have used in feeding their children.

Mr. Maclay: I entirely agree about the desirability of furniture being made available for such people, because I, too, have seen furniture in only one room where four rooms were available. But there is no provision in the Bill to make any difference in the kind of terms which will be available for people to buy furniture except, possibly, for a small difference in the rate of interest.

Miss Herbison: I hope that one difference will be that payment will be spread over a longer period. I hope that people will be able to pay monthly or quarterly, and that they will have less to pay by that means, than they would have had to pay under ordinary hire-purchase arrangements. This Bill is a good Bill; I believe it will go a little way to help the serious housing shortage in Scotland.

9.22 p.m.

Major McCallum: I hope the hon. Lady the Member for North Lanark (Miss Herbison) will forgive me if I do not follow her into the problems of housing in industrial areas, because I particularly wish to speak, in the short time at my disposal, about housing in the rural areas of Scotland, particularly the Highlands. Much has been said about the Debate which took place last Wednesday, but I also remember a Debate which took place on Tuesday of last week, when a very important speech was made by my hon. Friend the Member for West Perth (Mr. Snadden) about the stepping up of beef and livestock production in Scotland, and the Highland areas forming a great reservoir for the production of store cattle.
I would like to ask the Minister how he proposes to house the farm servants who will be required in the upland hill farms, the marginal farms, in remote areas, where the housing problem is so acute. The Joint Under-Secretary of State who is responsible for agriculture in Scotland knows this full well. The

Minister recently acquired 1,000 Swedish houses which were delivered to certain Highland areas. These houses were to be allocated to local authorities for the use more especially of agricultural workers. Allotments were made to the respective crofting counties, of which my own received a due allotment. A very good thing those houses will prove to be, though all of them have not yet arrived. I should like to deal for a moment with the erection of those houses. I understand they are being put up in groups in villages, and are supposed to be for farm servants of the surrounding farms. Those farms, however—and here I am talking particularly of my own area —are several miles from any village. The Secretary of State knows all about the difficulties of housing people in remote areas, but I suggest that he might be able to issue advice to local authorities in the crofting counties, advising them to put up those houses as economically and as suitably as they can, to house farm servants.
One of the arguments in reply to that may be that it is not economical to put them up in ones and twos, and that a group must be at least four houses. I know of a case in one village where four are being put up, and so far as I know there are no prospective agricultural workers to live in them. It would have been far better if two had been put in that village and two in another. These are rather detailed points, but I feel it would be a good thing if the Secretary of State could issue some advice on this subject to local authorities, not only in regard to these Swedish houses, but also in dealing with houses generally in rural areas.
I make no apology for raising again the issue of service cottages or tied houses. The Secretary of State attended a function in Scotland the other day at which he was asked questions on this subject of tied houses by members of the agricultural industry. I understand that he replied that he could not give way on this question of tied houses, because he could not go back to his party and look for their support. They would not support him in the matter.

Mr. Woodburn: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman say where he got his information?

Major McCallum: I got it from one of the weekly agricultural papers, and I


believe that is a fairly accurate summary of the report of the meeting. When my hon. Friend the Member for Central Aberdeen (Mr. Spence) was speaking, the hon. Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) interjected to ask why should public money be given to private owners to improve their properties. But who gets the benefit of the improvements carried out to these cottages? It is not the landowner or the proprietor, but the worker. It does not increase the value of the property-owner's property in the least. If he is proposing to dispose of the property within a certain number of years he is compelled to repay any grant. The landlord is not getting any benefit out of it. The only person who will get a benefit from it will be the farm workers, and those are the very people whom hon. Members opposite do not wish to see get any benefit, nor do they wish to provide houses for them.

Mr. Willis: The interesting thing about this is that the farm workers themselves do not seem to appreciate the benefits that the hon. and gallant Member seems to think they are going to get.

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: The hon. Member is not a farm worker.

Major McCallum: I can assure the hon. Member that in the Highlands, at any rate, the agricultural worker appreciates very much having a tied house. I have been told that by dozens and dozens of them.

Mr. Willis: Surely the representative organisations of the farm workers in Scotland are against tied houses?

Major McCallum: I cannot accept that, I am sorry to say.

Colonel Gomme-Duncan: The hon. Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) represents very few of them.

Major McCallum: What is the alternative? Probably a council house in the village. What rent would be charged for the council house? About £32 a year. That is the alternative that the farm worker has to accept for his tied cottage at a few shillings a week. If hon. Members will canvass the farm workers in the Highlands, I can assure them of the answer that they will get on this matter.
Now I turn to the position of the crofters and the applications they may

make to get assistance for the improvement or reconditioning of their houses. It is probably correct to say that they are not covered at all by the Bill, and that they are covered by the Agriculture (Scotland) Act. I should be glad to have that point cleared up. I am speaking about the crofting community and the improvement or modernising of their houses, in the way in which they were assisted by the 1936 Housing (Rural Workers) (Scotland) Act.
I want to refer to other tied cottages. Within recent months the Forestry Commission have acquired 1,000 Finnish wooden houses for erection in Scotland, on the various plantations, for the forestry workers. In my constituency there is one place on Loch Awe and another in Glendaruel, where the Finnish houses have been lying on the roadside all through the winter. Nothing was done about putting them up. We shall be told that they were covered over with tarpaulins. They were. They were put out there, tarpaulins were put over them, and there they were left for months. I have made inquiries about them from the local authority and I have been to inspect them. I found that, as the result of the winter weather, most of the tarpaulins have been blown off. The wooden houses are lying in sections on the roadside, and are deteriorating rapidly. I am told that even when they are dried out again, to be put up in sections as houses, they will be SQ warped that they will be useless.
There are 30 houses for Loch Awe and about 20 in Glendaruel, some 50; houses in all, and there is very great risk of their being completely wasted. They are good wooden Finnish houses. I am afraid that the trouble lies in some dispute or misunderstanding, or something not being agreed upon between the Department of Health for Scotland, the Forestry Commission and the local authority. It may be something about the sites or the services. I hope that the local authority of the Forestry Commission will be able to have something done about it and so clear up the situation.
I turn to the housing estate which it is proposed to put up at Kinlochmore and Kinlochleven. The right hon. Gentleman may remember that I corresponded with him about these houses and that there has recently been a lawsuit, in which


the British Aluminium Company have suffered very heavily financially, because of the fluorine gasses which have caused much damage to property around Fort William. The local authorities are proceeding with a housing estate there, and the right hon. Gentleman wrote to me to say that the housing estate would come to no harm although it was very near the factory at Kinlochleven. He said in his letter that there was no danger to this site because it lies slightly out of the stream of the prevailing wind. I wonder that a question about the prevailing wind was not put up by counsel in the case of the Fort William factory.
I ask the Secretary of State to reconsider the matter. It is not a question of today or tomorrow; it is a question whether the families living in those 50 houses will, all their lives, suffer the bad effects proved to have been suffered by some people living in the vicinity of the Fort William factory. This causes a great deal of anxiety and disquiet in the Kinlochleven area; I have had representations from numbers of people. Judging from the reception that this Bill has had in the rural and Highland areas of Scotland, I do not think that it will do much to solve the problems of those areas.

9.37 p.m.

Mr. J. L. Williams: I welcome the Bill not because it will be an important contribution to the building of new houses here and now, but because it is a piece of legislation dealing with wider and more far-reaching aspects of housing policy. That is important, and it will tell on the drive for new houses in the years to come.
Like other hon. Members, I am concerned with the question of diverting materials from the building of new houses to the efforts connected with the Bill; I am concerned with this for the same reason as my hon. Friend the Member for Gorbals (Mrs. Cullen), because of the large number of people in my constituency who are waiting for houses and depending upon the building drive. I am concerned not only about materials but also about labour. I believe that the labour aspect should be emphasised more than that of materials, and I believe that it is felt in the building industry that in connection with reconditioning we are

spending more proportionately on labour than in the case of new building. We are spending on labour and materials in reconditioning in the ratio of 60 to 40, while in the building of new houses we are spending on labour and materials in the ratio of 40 to 60. That is, no doubt, an arbitrary estimate, but it is at the same time sufficient indication that we should be concerned, allowing for equal scarcity in both cases, about labour even more than about materials.
The question of reconditioning has been dealt with at length tonight, and I will only speak upon one or two aspects which have been rather overlooked. Mention has been made of Part I which extends the provisions of the Housing Acts from the housing of the working classes to the housing of all members of the community. This is rather more important than some hon. Members opposite have been able to accept, because it goes to the root of society. There has been a tendency in recent years in our big towns to have large communities developing upon an income basis. Indeed the development of our big towns has been worse in that direction, notwithstanding all the modern tendencies, than the development of the small country towns, because, in the latter, despite the class feeling that might be shown, certain geographic limits compel people to live together in one society. Today large towns with large communities are developing which are roughly dissimilar on an income basis. We want to get away from that, because that dissimilarity is undesirable and unhealthy for the development of modern society.
My other point deals with hostels which, so far as I know, have not been mentioned. I believe that local authorities should be enabled to build these hostels for young people and for single people living in big towns who have come in from the country to do the work of those big towns. In my early life I had a lengthy, varied and interesting experience of "living in digs," and I can speak with authority on the subject. It may be argued that the question of hostels is not immediately important. If, however, we are to have large numbers of workers coming into a big city to do the work of that city, it is important to house them in this way. It is a desirable and economic form of housing, I suggest.

9.45 p.m.

Mr. Duthie: In view of the lateness of the hour, I shall confine my remarks to a few practical considerations of great importance to the North-East of Scotland in general and to Banffshire in particular. At the risk of repetition, I should like to touch upon the position of the tied cottage, which was referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Central Aberdeen (Mr. Spence) and my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Argyll (Major McCallum). The substitution of the tenancy form of tenure for the present tied system is something which is causing a great deal of concern amongst country farmers, particularly in the North-East. Each farm has grown through the generations into a self-contained community. These farms are not adjacent to each other and are sometimes many miles apart. This is particularly true of farms in the glen areas. As my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) said in speaking of Ayrshire farms, what is true of the Ayrshire dairy farm is more than true of the stock and dairy farms in Banffshire and Aberdeenshire generally. The men must live on the job. Anyone who is conversant with the feeding of cattle, the raising of that prime beef of which the country stands in great need, must know that the stockmen and cowmen must be on the job practically all the time; and in view of the incidence of illness amongst the stock; and many other factors, it is necessary that they should be on call practically at all hours of the day and night.
Because of that necessity, the farm cottage—the tied cottage—has come into being and has been the greatest boon to Scottish agriculture. I would point out also that the holding of the cottage by the tenant farmer is part and parcel of a legal contract with the landlord. The tenant farmer is in duty bound to make the service cottage available for the occupation and benefit of workers on the farm. If the cottage is to become untied, the terms of the leases are broken, and a considerable amount of unsettlement, and perhaps unemployment, will result.
We must consider also the position of the owner farmer. Many of our landlord farmers are working farmers who own their own farms. Some very considerable schemes for the rehabilitation of their farm buildings, and of their cottages in

particular, are being held up pending the outcome of the legislation which is now before the House. For the life of me I cannot understand why there should be all this fuss about the untying of cottages, and going to the trouble of putting it in this Bill, because it seems to me that the application of the Rent Restrictions Act, 1933, reduces this problem to mathematical dimensions; it becomes the axiom. "Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to one another." The cottage ceases to be a tied cottage, but by the application of the Rent Restrictions Act it becomes a tied cottage again.
If I am correctly informed, and my quotation is correct, the 1933 Rent Restrictions Act provides that if the agricultural worker leaves, and a certificate is granted by the agricultural committee that the cottage is required for another agricultural worker who is to take over his job, then that is a ground for getting possession without offering alternative accommodation. I am referring to paragraph (d) of the First Schedule to the 1933 Rent Restrictions Act. If that is so, then all this seems to be a veritable storm in a teacup. It will remain so if the Government gives to Scottish landlords that same assurance which is implicit in the Rent Restrictions Act. If it is intended, however, to alter that Act, then this is a different story and one of which we would take the most serious view. But the fact remains that considerable rehabilitation schemes for farm cottages are held up pending the outcome of our deliberations. What I am saying applies not only to farms but also to lime quarries and distilleries, all of which are integral parts of our farming economy.
Another point upon which I would like to speak is the type of houses erected in the North. Some of the approved types are quite unsuitable for our northern climate. I have a letter which was written by the contractors to the Banffshire County Council, dealing with the inadequacy of the roofs of Cruden houses, from which I will quote. It says:
The recent severe gales have revealed serious defects in the construction of the roofs. The specification of these roofs was originally approved by the Building Research Committee and recommended by the Department of Health. We would stress that the roofs have been constructed to the specification and whilst they appear to be satisfactory in the South of Scotland, they do not appear to be able to stand the exposed conditions in the North.


In recommending types of houses for the North in future, I hope the right hon. Gentleman will recommend that they should be subjected to the exacting conditions which obtain in an ordinary winter in the North.
I make an appeal on another matter, on which I am sure I will have the ready ear of the Joint Under-Secretary of State, as it concerns members of a community from which both he and I sprang, the fishermen. The fisherman's house has a particular problem which is not common to that of the artisan. Along with his family, his gear must be housed—his nets, his ropes, his buoys, and so on. It is idle to say that they can go into a communal store, because there they cannot be repaired and looked after. From time immemorial, gear has been housed with the family in fishing communities along the Scottish coasts. Present houses supplied by local authorities do not provide that accommodation for fishermen. One of the functions of the fishing industry which is performed in the home is mending the nets. This is done by the wife, daughters and female relatives of the fisherman. That is their task, accepted gladly, and they are expert workers. It is essential that that work should be done in the home. In the houses supplied by local authorities no such accommodation is given.
I was in a Cruden house in a fishing village on the North East coast a short time ago. The house was occupied by a fisherman and his wife and children. One bedroom had to be given up for the repair of nets. If we are to retain our population of herring fishermen we have to give them homes which are suitable for their families and also for their gear. That would almost call for a special type of house to be devised for herring fishermen. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to encourage seaboard local authorities to develop a type of house suitable for herring fishermen, and to see that they are given a special grant to make those houses possible, in ratio to the demands made upon the local authority to house herring fishermen.

Mr. Gallacher: Would it not be highly desirable to have a house for the family and an outhouse for the gear?

Mr. Duthie: That is done in some cases, but that is not the ideal. I know

the ideal, because I was brought up in a house where the ideal was practised, and it is an attic store for nets. Then the mending can be done in the evening and one does not have to trapes from the house to the store when the mending is completed. Many fishermen in the North have made application to local authorities to build houses with net stores, and so far these have been refused. Many older fishermen living in council houses would be only too happy to build their own houses, but again applications have been refused. The finest earnest of the right hon. Gentleman's intention to do all he can for Scottish housing would be immediately to grant those applications for private buildings which I have put before him quite recently. I make a final appeal on the question of the herring fishermen, even at the risk of reiteration. Because it is something which may have been overlooked in the past, do not let us overlook it now, for the retention of the herring man in his industry is a matter of fundamental importance to this country.

9.55 p.m.

Mr. Rankin: The hon. Member for Montrose Burghs (Mr. Maclay) asked us not to go too much into history on this question. I agree with him but, unfortunately, history is something like heaven. It lies about us in our infancy and clings to us all the days of our lives. I am not surprised that the party opposite desire to get away from it, because it is largely due to their history that we on this side of the House have such a rosy future.
I wish to say a word or two about the figures which were put forward by the hon. Member for Camlachie (Mr. McFarlane). I am sorry that he is not in his place, but the figures which he gave must be dealt with. I am not in any way suggesting that he was influenced by any thought of electoral advantage. I am willing to believe that his use of the figures and the fact of the oncoming municipal elections in Glasgow was merely coincidental. Nevertheless, the fact that he lamented the inadequacy of the housing figures in Glasgow implied some sort of blame to the Corporation of Glasgow, which, of course, is dominated by the Labour Party.
The hon. Member pointed out that the number of units of housing completed by the Corporation of Glasgow was 8,000—it is a little more than that, 8,178—in the three years from January, 1945, to December, 1948.

Commander Galbraith: That is four years.

Mr. Rankin: It is. I was subtracting 45 from 48. I am glad to see that the hon. and gallant Member's prowess in arithmetic has not deserted him, and has enabled him to correct my error. The figures given by the hon. Member for Camlachie were 8,178, but they are figures which we are entitled to compare with the corresponding figures after the last war, when the party now in Opposition were in power. In that period, the number of houses completed in Glasgow was a little over 2,000—

Sir W. Darling: By local authorities.

Mr. Rankin: —and the number of houses completed in the whole of Scotland in that period was 8,137. So in the corresponding period after this war the Labour Council in Glasgow had completed more houses in the city than were completed in the whole of Scotland by the Conservative Party when they were in power.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Rankin: Do not all jump up at once. I am not giving way. Hon. Members opposite know quite well that I give way freely but on this occasion I am sorry that I cannot give way. I say that the performance of the Labour majority on the Glasgow Council has been a better one for the City of Glasgow than was the performance of the Tory Party in the whole of Scotland for the period after the last war. I will say further that if we compare the position in Glasgow today so far as permanent Douses are concerned, we find that Glasgow has built 5,628 permanent houses. More houses were built by the Labour Corporation in Glasgow than have been built in Birmingham and Liverpool combined in the same period of time, and more than the number built in Liverpool and Manchester in the same period of time. So that Glasgow has no reason to be ashamed of its record.
We admit quite freely that it is not as many houses as we would like to see being built. But as I say our efforts have been conditioned by the history of the party that now sits opposite. We have to remember this other fact, that Glasgow might have increased its total number of housing units considerably had it departed from its planning.

Sir W. Darling: Oh!

Mr. Rankin: I know that the hon. Member for South Edinburgh (Sir W. Darling) hates the sound of the word "planning." He is the supreme anarchist and the word "planning" almost chokes him. Glasgow refused to depart from the planning of its housing system and therefore it did not go in for the temporary house. Because of that fact the figures in Glasgow are not nearly so great as they would have been if Glasgow had followed the bad example of Edinburgh in that respect.
I wish to deal with one particular part of the Bill which has not so far been mentioned. I have nothing to say about Parts I, III, IV and V. I cannot understand the fuss which the Oppoosition have been making over this rather mild Measure. Part I, as the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) admitted is merely an extension of a practice already in being. Glasgow already provides houses for its doctors and dentists, and Part I is simply an extension of that. Part III contains nothing new in principle, and so far as Parts IV and V are concerned I do not propose to spend any time on them, because I do not think that there is any difference of opinion with regard to them. I do, however, wish to look at Part II, and especially that part which provides for financial assistance for improving existing housing accommodation. In the Debate so far, the present position has not been explored.
We want to ask what is the present position with regard to the provision of financial assistance for the improvement of existing housing accommodation by local authorities. Provision exists under Defence Regulation 51. Under that regulation, everything proposed in Part II can already be carried out. The local authority can take over abandoned


houses. That is provided for in the Bill. The local authority can take big houses and break them up into smaller houses. That also is provided for in Part II. The local authority can take over houses used by Service Departments, and they can requisition shops for the purpose of turning them into dwellings. All these things can be done at present under Regulation 51. Part II makes no change except that under the Defence Regulation my right hon. Friend must pay to the local authority 100 per cent. of the cost they incurred in requisitioning and improving buildings to make them habitable, while under the Bill he takes 25 per cent. of that cost and puts it on the shoulders of the local authority, and he only pays 75 per cent. If my interpretation is correct, I suggest that in the long run, my right hon. Friend will not improve existing housing accommodation by increasing the burden of cost on the local authority. To me, that is one of the serious features of the financial arrangement.
There is a further point. I have examined the Bill and, so far as I can follow it, there is nothing in it which cancels Defence Regulation 51. Even when this Bill becomes an Act, a local authority will still have the power to say to my right hon. Friend, "We propose to proceed to carry out these provisions under Defence Regulation 51." They have that power. Will my right hon. Friend allow both methods of procedure if this Bill becomes law? Will he allow them both to run concurrently, or will he say to the local authorities who ask for power to take over a building to convert it into smaller dwellings, "You cannot do it under the regulation. I shall compel you to proceed under the Bill." In proceeding under the Bill, he will fling upon the local authorities a burden which, I submit, will compel them not to proceed to carry out these improvements in housing conditions in Glasgow which I hope everyone here wishes to see.
There is this further point which I wish to put to my right hon. Friend. Under the Defence Regulations local authorities have power to requisition buildings occupied by Service Departments, and until recently Service Departments were instructed: "Get rid of these buildings as quickly as you can. When

a local authority comes forward to requisition, do not oppose them. "Within the last month or so Service Departments have been instructed not to get rid of these buildings, but to hang on to them. That means that when a local authority wants to requisition one of these buildings, the Service Departments will resist. I wonder whether they will be supported? I wonder what is the reason for that step? It may be twofold, although I hope that the second suspected reason is non-existent.
That one aspect which I have raised is to me a very serious one, because I represent in the City of Glasgow a Division which has terrible housing conditions. They may not be very different from some others, but I must speak about them. In Marlow Street, in the last two years, the entire end of a property inhabited by human beings just collapsed through sheer exhaustion and lack of sustenance; it fell down.

Mr. Kirkwood: And they were getting rent for it.

Mr. Rankin: Yes, they were getting rent for it. I have been in a house in Watt Street in which I could shove my two hands into a crack between the sides of the bedroom; the whole building was just slipping down. That house was inhabited by men to whom we are today appealing for increased production—the engineers and the workers on the Clyde-side. The whole of that building is coming down. I had to direct my right hon. Friend's attention to the fact that in a house in Blackburn Street, in which human beings were living, the whole side of the building was falling out. I have been in one house in which there was only room for a bed and a little distance to move about in, with a mother and ten children, the oldest 19 and the youngest standing not much higher than these benches, all living there. On Friday night in Midlock Street I stood in a house the tenant of which had that week caught 14 rats. My right hon. Friend has a letter on that subject.
That is only a glimpse at the housing conditions in the Tradeston Division today. I am anxious that this Bill should do something to remedy those conditions. I hope that in limiting the powers which local authorities have today under Defence Regulation 51 my right hon.


Friend is not doing something which, instead of assisting to improve these conditions, may actually make them worse than they are.

10.14 p.m.

Sir William Darling: This afternoon and evening we have had an almost all-Scottish Debate, except for the fleeting visitation of the Lord President who looked in, I take it, to see that we were not spending more money than our English colleagues. I think the Secretary of State must be a little disappointed at the reception given to his Bill. He cannot have listened with any less feelings of emotion than I did to the eloquent speech of the hon. Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin), and when we remember that the hon. Member for Tradeston speaks for a Division of Glasgow, and that Glasgow has been ruled by a Socialist council since 1934 and by this Government for the last four years, we see how bitter these conclusions must be to him and to those who share his views. We have heard throughout the Debate a great deal about the years of Tory misrule and about the responsibilities for housing in the past. I am willing to accept those responsibilities, but the Members who make such observations must direct them, on this occasion at any rate, rather narrowly to the Tradeston Division, which has had the infinite benefit since 1934 of a Socialist local administration supported today by a national one.

Mrs. Mann: Will not the hon. Member admit that when the Socialists got control in 1934 the Government of the day withdrew the only Act under which they could build, namely, the Wheately Act?

Sir W. Darling: The hon. Lady is an astute and able debater, but I do not think we had anything to do with the 34 rats—

Mr. Rankin: It was only 14.

Sir W. Darling: —nor for the collapses through dilapidation. Glasgow has long had power to deal with buildings in ruinous and dangerous condition, and if the hon. Lady has forgotten her municipal experience, then let me have the honour of reminding her.
This Bill has not been given a good reception. I do not think the Secretary of State expected it to get one. If I may put myself in his place, I think he said to himself, "We had better do some tidying up in this matter of Scottish housing. The English Bill has had a good run, so let us see what we can do. England is a bit ahead in housing, so I had better go before the House of Commons and say something about the Scottish position." These little bits and pieces, picked up and cast out from previous reports, are interesting reading but a little flyblown; they are very familiar to us. The right hon. Gentleman has not held office for the whole of the past four years, but he and his predecessors—some are dead and some are fled—have, and therefore he must accept responsibility for the last four years. He will agree that during that time he has not been very well pleased, and do not let him be under the delusion that Scotland is pleased.
The housing position is deplorable, and if a Tory administration or an administration other than a Socialist administration were in power, the veil of the temple would be rent in twain. The mouths of the Socialist supporters are stopped, and quite rightly stopped, by their own inadequacy. They can only rail about the evils of the past, which all deplore and none can remedy. It is in the hands of the Government, inspired by all the genius and apparently commanding all the capital they require. I am not surprised that there are pained looks on the faces of Members opposite. The hon. Lady the Member for North Lanark (Miss Herbison) has gone. I was afraid that she was going to break down because of the tragic condition in which she found herself, unable to blame the Tory Party and unable to move the Minister to achieve anything better.
The problem is a very real one, and we on this side are willing to take all the blame for all the miseries if, having made that admission, the Government will make a start with a new sheet. Look to the past four years, during which the Government have had full power and authority: the achievement has been a very inadequate and tragic one. It is not I but the long eloquent waiting lists in every local authority office in Scotland that cry out. It is those who believed,


rightly or wrongly, that they would get a house when they came back from the war, those who believed Labour would get things done, who indict the Government, and not Members on this side.
The real problem is that there is and always has been a tremendous shortage of houses in Scotland. The remedy, of course, is to concentrate on that shortage, and once the shortage is remedied then overcrowding and slum clearance will fall into their proper place and disappear. That is why those who spoke from our point of view at the General Election recommended, not a narrow approach, but an approach on every line possible. We wanted local authorities to do all they could, and private enterprise to do all it could. We believe that anyone who could build anything better than a shack should be encouraged to do so. Having dealt with the problem of accommodation we would then steadily raise the standards. The Government have chosen one instrument only—the local authority. Those who have served on a local authority know how inadequate that instrument can often be.
I am interested in Part I of the Bill, which shows that the Government have thought of something new. They are now going to deal with the question of housing all the people, and not only the working class. This, it seems, requires a special piece of legislation. Considering the working class support which the Government claim to have, it would have been wiser if they had first housed the working class. Like Alexander, they are sighing for new worlds to conquer before they have conquered the first. The Government say, "We cannot house the working class so we will change the name. We will abolish the working class, and thereby deal with the situation." That seems clever, but it is not impressive. I do not mind who houses me, but if I have to have a house I want a house and not a baptism. The Government are deserting their duty. They got the votes of the workers. Perhaps the hon. Member for Kelvingrove (Mr. J. L. Williams), particularly, feels that the working class vote is not enough. So, the Government have broadened the basis, and seek the vote of those who are described as the middle class, the salariat. But the middle class do not want Government housing. They

want to provide their own homes. Why not let them? The building societies are only too ready to help them, but the Government are an impediment in their way.
I was struck by the argument in the Debate on the English Bill, in which the Minister of Health made one of those utterances which will make for him a certain place in the political history of today and tomorrow. Talking about the choice of houses, he said:
Only a public authority can choose between the relative claims of different applicants for houses. That cannot be done by private persons acting upon private enterprise only."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 16th March, 1949; Vol. 462, c. 2133.]
It seems that men and women joined together in holy matrimony cannot choose a house. The Minister of Health says this can only be done by a public body. In the bad old days when men and women married they found a house—true, with some difficulty, but they did find one. Now, only a public authority can choose, says the Minister of Health, whose faithful disciple the Secretary of State is no doubt proud to call himself. Gone are the days when an Englishman's home was his castle. His home is now chosen for him by a public authority—and so is his gaol.

Mr. Ross: Surely the hon. Gentleman is misinterpreting what the Minister of Health actually said. He said that the public authority could best make the decision as to whose priority was greatest for the actual houses.

Sir W. Darling: I do not think I am misinterpreting what he said. He argued that it was not for the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) and his bride or for the hon. Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) and his bride to choose their homes, but it was competent for the local authority to choose between the abundant merits of the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and those of the hon. Member for North Edinburgh. If the hon. Member will read what the Minister of Health said, he will find that it will beat out my assertion. Where there is any dispute as to who shall have the house, the deciding factor is the official, and it is the same type of official who decides whether I go to gaol or not
Part II of the Bill is very interesting because of the admission that there are


houses in this country. Obviously His Majesty's Government would not propose to improve those houses if they did not exist, and so for the first time a Bill is brought before us which declares that in this barren, naked land of Scotland, in which everyone lived in caves under Tory misrule, there were, after all, over one million houses. These are all capable of improvement. These are the houses which the degenerate Tories built, but they must have done their job well because the houses have lasted and they are now capable of improvement. It is asked why they were not improved before? The answer is equally obvious. Taxation has been so severe that the landlords have been taxed almost out of existence. They are called "landlords," but they are neither possessors of land, nor are they lords. They are house providers, who were indiscreet and foolish enough to choose to invest money in house property, for which there was such a low return and so little gratitude. It is because this Government have so heavily taxed the landlord that this animal has now decided not to be a landlord any more. He has left the responsibility to the community, with very much less desirable results to the people in need of houses, and also at greater cost.
The Government have been penalising the landlord for a long time and the sufferers, oddly enough, are not the landlords because, according to hon. Members opposite, they can get away with anything. The people who are suffering are the tenants. When I was a youth there were plenty of houses to let. I remember that my mother had the choice of at least six flats when she wanted accommodation. The agents came to her asking her if she would take this one and they would do up the kitchen, or this other one and they would do up the drawing room. That is not my experience today, nor is it the experience of anyone in this House. What has happened to make houses which were abundant so scarce? I will tell the House. It is because of the busybody interference of public authorities, who have tried to provide houses and have failed catastrophically in their efforts.
Part III of the Bill deals with houses of character. I do not see much encouragement here for individuals. Under this part of the Bill certain allowances

are to be made to local authorities and the Special Housing Association to build houses of character. Why those bodies? Are those advantages only to be conferred on organised bodies who are either the "stooges" of His Majesty's Government or local authorities? Do not His Majesty's Government think that there are persons with ideas in Scotland, who might conceive an idea to build houses of character and should be encouraged? It seems that His Majesty's Government believe that all the intelligence of Scotland rests in committees. They have not seen as much of committees as I have. Individual Scotsmen are more entitled to public confidence than that. On hostels and building experiments I make the same observations. Why are these advantages not being made available to private persons? Why are local authorities alone to be instruments of his blundering folly, when we know that they have failed His Majesty's Government in the task already assigned to them, which is the provision of houses for the people?
When I look at Part IV I note three miscellaneous and entirely objectionable Clauses under which there is the provision of finance for the purchase of houses. That has been done very adequately and successfully by the people themselves. There are a score of first-class building societies. I am not a member of one, nor do I subscribe to any, but these people provide money for this purpose. The Government put their blundering feet into this territory in which they can only operate at a loss. They desire to enter the laundry business. I remark in relation to this that unless they wish to wash dirty linen in public, I do not know why the Government want laundries. The people are satisfied with their own laundries. They are buying washing machines by the score and would buy more if the Purchase Tax were removed. The Government apparently want to set up laundries in every community, whether those communities desire them or not.
In addition, the Government are going to enter the hire purchase business. This is a greedy grab for gold. They are going to take over the Prudential, and presumably would like to take over the Times Furnishing Co. and other distribut-


ing stores. What justification can there be in a Housing Act, which is intended to provide better houses for Scotland, for such futilities as these? These are not the marks of serious-minded men, of men addressing themselves to this task. Scotland desperately needs new houses. The plight of the people is deplorable.
To put on the Statute Book a Bill in which in the aggregate there is nothing but trivialities is an insult to Scottish intelligence. Here we have a few interesting suggestions culled from the specialists of St. Andrew's House, patient men and women who have collected together and presented to the Minister as upon a chalice, these little bits and pieces to embody in a Bill which may satisfy the House of Commons; but it will not satisfy the people of Scotland. It will go through this Bill, Clause by Clause, we find that its sum total is a round nothing. I regret to say that the Secretary of State for Scotland knows that as well as I do.

10.32 p.m.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: May I ask your guidance, Mr. Speaker? At Question Time yesterday, the Leader of the House assured us that there would be some recompense to Scottish Members for the time allotted to the discussion of the Motion by the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg). I should like to ask whether the speech by the Secretary of State for Scotland will conclude this Debate, or whether the Debate will continue after; that speech?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member surely noticed that we passed an Order today suspending the Rule. I may call upon the right hon. Gentleman, but that does not interfere with the hon. Member's right if he wishes to carry on the Debate.

10.33 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Woodburn): I have no complaint to make about the reception accorded this Bill. A good deal of the discussion, of course, has been about the various housing problems of hon. Gentlemen, and they have made no reference either to the provisions of this Bill or to what is contained in it. For instance, the hon. and gallant Member for Argyll (Major McCallum) had an Adjournment Debate

all of his own in the middle of the discussion of this Bill on the necessities of Highland housing and the distribution in the Highlands of timber houses and other matters. Some of these points have been dealt with in Adjournment Debates and in other ways, and I am sure that hon. Members would not wish me to take up the time of the House in replying to these various matters which were interposed into the discussion of the Bill.
I should like to deplore what is becoming a habit of some hon. Members opposite of taking every possible occasion to depreciate Scotland and Scotland's affairs. The way they come into this House and elevate English Ministers really is very sad. If they can cast any slur upon Scotland, they have not the slightest objection to doing so. If they can depreciate Scottish Ministers and make them appear in the public eye as something of no importance, they go out of their way to do it. There is an old Scottish proverb which says, "It is an ill bird which fouls its ain nest." I hope that this will be kept in mind by these hon. Members when bringing these things against their own Ministers and countrymen.
The problem of Scottish housing is not something new, nor is its solution anything new. The hon. Member for South Edinburgh (Sir W. Darling) was, I presume, speaking for the Conservative Party; therefore, I gather that it is no longer the purpose of the Conservative Party to use the local authorities as an instrument for the building of houses, should that party ever come back into power in this country. That is a change of policy. The hon. Member condemns the use of the local authorities for this purpose so far as the Labour Party are concerned, but when Mr. Willink was Minister of Health in 1944, he told the House that, however much we might believe in private enterprise, most of our houses would be built by local authorities.
But the problem of housing in Scotland is much more serious than this silly party talk. It is going to be extremely difficult for anybody who tackles this problem to solve it. I would remind hon. Members that, in the years between the wars—in the whole 20 years—only 400,000 houses were built. Now we are expected to build 500,000 in three years. It is certainly a


flattering expectation which hon. Members opposite have of us, but if one talks seriously, one must admit that, if only 400,000 were built in 20 years, it is an impossible demand on the building trade to expect such an achievement when the trade is depleted and disorganised, and when there is a shortage of materials which never existed between the wars. Sixteen thousand, five hundred houses a year were put up between the wars, but 21,211 permanent houses were built last year in Scotland. The hon. and gallant Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) said he could not find these figures in the Report. That is because he had not counted in the permanent aluminium houses—a total of 1,500. In the same time after this war as after the first, 25 times as many houses have been provided in Edinburgh.

Lord William Scott: It is not comparable. Will the Secretary of State say whether the 21,000 odd houses built last year were actually built or finished last year?

Mr. Woodburn: Finished for occupation.

Lord William Scott: That is what I thought. A great many were started a year before—[Interruption]—Well, the Secretary of State said they were built last year.

Mr. Woodburn: Hon. Members must know that that is always the case. Very few houses are finished in the year in which they are started. All these houses have been provided since the war, and 25 times as many were built in Edinburgh in the same period after this war as compared with the first war. To say that we are not providing houses is grossly to mislead the population. Hon. Members have asked why more houses are not built. I can tell them that I met representatives of the building trade at a public conference at which there were members of the Press. The Press men put questions, and one of the answers of the building trade representatives was that the reason for the slow-up in the building of houses was that we had asked the trade to do more than it could undertake.
I have already pointed out that the building industry is disorganised and depleted; it cannot get all the materials we would like. In other words, it was

a question of more haste, less speed, because contractors who had taken on a large number of contracts could only do a portion of them, with the result that there was a lack of economy, wastage of effort and the very conditions that the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok described—a rise in cost and an uneven flow of materials spread over too many projects. Therefore, 18 months ago it was my duty to bring that sort of thing to a stop by getting materials concentrated in a flow where it could be put into the houses.
The hon. Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) raised one of the fundamental points about this Bill—why should public money be given to private owners of property to improve that property? It is very unfortunate that this question cannot be discussed objectively, just as many housing problems cannot be discussed objectively, because the history of landlords in Scotland has created such a prejudice that no reason can appear to enter into anything concerning landlords. Therefore, however reasonable may be some of the arguments put forward by the hon. and gallant Member for Pollok about the difficulties most landlords are having, it is almost impossible to give those questions impartial consideration because of the prejudice created by landlords in the past by their behaviour in regard to rents and tenants. Landlords today are undoubtedly suffering for the sins of their fathers.
Let us take Glasgow. Undoubtedly the great problem arising in Glasgow is that house property which is becoming steadily worse is being offered to the local, authority; the property is in such a condition that the landlord will no longer keep it up and the local authority finds it impossible to do anything with it either. That means that the local authority is faced with the responsibility of providing new houses for the people in those properties, and that is not only costly to the local authority but costly to the State. If these houses could be maintained in a proper condition, even to give the local authority time to accomplish their job, it would be an economy both to the State and to that local authority. That is the first reason why money is being given to private persons to maintain property in a condition which wilt make it last longer.

Commander Galbraith: What is the good of doing that when a man has already suffered and the loss will only be increased?

Mr. Woodburn: I will come to that. I am answering the hon. Member for North Edinburgh. If a house can be maintained for 30 years and made into practically a modern house at half the cost of a new house, that will still be an economy to the public. Therefore, from the point of view of the public, this is being done first of all. It is clearly the case, whatever we may think about it, that people who are homeless and requiring new houses, who are overcrowded and require new houses, who are living in substantial old houses that are not likely to be condemned, are all qualified tenants for new houses and it will be a long time before they can get the advantage of going into new houses.
This Bill is not for the benefit of landlords, but for the benefit of tenants. It is not the landlord who gets the benefit. It is amazing to me how many people there are who are prepared to refuse these benefits because for some theoretical reason they think the landlord will benefit. I cannot understand it. I have known persons who, though skilled men, would refuse to repair windows for their wives because it was the landlord's duty to do it. That is really fantastic. The whole purpose of this Bill is to try to give the people who live in substantial old houses some of the amenities they might get if they moved into new houses.
Why should they get them? They get them for the reason that they themselves pay taxes and rates and are thus paying a contribution to give houses to other people. They are themselves entitled to share in the benefits the State is providing, as are the people who get the new houses. In this Bill every care, perhaps too much care, has been taken to see that no benefit of a financial kind goes to the landlord. The hon. Member for Banff (Mr. Duthie) pointed out that some landlords are losing money on houses. I defy any hon. Member to show how any landlord can take money out of a house under this Bill. Even if he sells it he has to pay back to the Government any advance that they make.

Mr. McFarlane: But why should a Scottish landlord be placed in an invidious position compared with a landlord across the Border?

Mr. Woodburn: That point has been raised and I will come to it. This Bill gives no financial advantage to the landlord. There is considerable doubt whether the private landlord, unless he is very generous, will actually go the extent of using this Bill to make repairs to a house. It is an entirely false idea that the landlord is going to get any financial benefit from the Bill, and the question is whether the inducement is sufficient to make the landlord do anything at all. That is a question which can only be proved in practice.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite are keen about people owning their own houses, but I notice that not one of them has commented on the benefit that comes to owner-occupiers under the Bill—that any person owning a house can get a grant from the Government to improve the house. We have heard much about the railwaymen, who out of 18s. a week which they received in wages, managed to save up to buy their own houses. Some of them are substantial, decent houses and they could be improved. These men can get a grant if they are prepared to make a contribution as well. The fact of the matter is that this Bill will enable the local authority to provide help to individuals for the housing of people, and to provide help to individuals going out of their way to improve their houses.
On the subject of tied houses, we are told that the landlord cannot do anything under the Bill and yet the farmers are complaining that they cannot have its advantages. If there are advantages, they will go to the landlords in the urban areas and in the rural areas. So far as the agricultural tied houses are concerned. I may say that I have met the farmers and the farm workers and they cannot agree about the tied houses. It is not for me to set up as an arbitrator and force something on people who do not want it. This Bill is for the benefit of the farm workers. The other day I addressed farmers about this, and was asked several questions. One man who put a question did so in such a manner that he was clearly concerned about the power to evict people. The attitude of mind which


he represented makes it impossible for a Government to give powers to evict people at a moment's notice. It is this eviction of people at a moment's notice that has made for all the bitter feeling about the tied houses. No Government would give powers to evict.
Scottish farmers assure me that they want to keep the tied houses because of the goodwill between themselves and the farm workers. The Government are not going to interfere with this goodwill between farmers and farm workers. If they will explain to the Government what they want, I shall be prepared to examine it. I am not prepared to take sides in a fight of this kind, and it is up to the farmers and farm workers to come to an agreement. Farmers have an advantage under the provisions of the Agriculture Act: if they are prepared to provide a new house for a farm worker, they will get a grant for replacing a tied house, which gives them a considerable advantage.
The question of long waiting lists was mentioned. The Government have helped to create long waiting lists as they have provided people with full employment, which gives them wages from which they can afford to pay rent. If there were two million people unemployed and in the state in which they were between the two wars, there would be no waiting lists for houses. The full employment of today, the fact that people are prosperous, that young people are able to get married and that old people are able to keep their houses where formerly they were driven out by poverty in old age, have intensified the housing problem.

Commander Galbraith: The right hon. Gentleman said that before the war there were no waiting lists. Surely he is mistaken?

Mr. Woodburn: I did not say there were no waiting lists. I said that if there were two or three millions of unemployed, there would be no waiting lists. The small waiting lists before the war were due to the fact that a number of people could not afford to ask for new houses, and some did not think that they were entitled. A new psychology exists among the people. [Interruption.] There is no question at all. If the hon. Member will go into the Canongate of Edinburgh he will find people living in one room. They deserve new houses.

Prior to the first war, and between the wars, they did not know what new houses were. There is a new spirit abroad which causes disturbance only to those who would like people always to be quiet and content. I welcome the demand for new houses, and hope that people will never be content with slums and degrading conditions.
The hon. Member for Banff raised a point about fishermen's houses. If he looks at Clause 20 (3) of the Bill, he will find that:
A dwelling shall not be deemed for the purposes of this Part of this Act to be used for purposes other than those of a private dwelling-house by reason only that part thereof is used as a shop or office, or for business, trade or professional purposes.
That brings fishing cottages well within the definition of "house." Another question raised was whether a tied house had to be untied before application could be made for a grant. Under the Bill as it stands it is the case that it would have to be untied first, but we can see that a reasonable point has been made, and will consider it before we come to the Committee stage.
Several other points were raised. Many will come up again on the Committee stage. Regarding furniture, the supply is not going to be very much different than it has been. In the old Acts it would appear that the practice was to supply furniture to the house, and although it has been supplied to the tenants it was not very clear what the law actually said. The Bill merely makes certain in a legal form the position in regard to the supply of furniture to tenants going into such houses. It has been a great convenience and in some places has made all the difference between a new home and just walls in an old home.
Reference has been made to laundries and meals. Municipal wash-houses have never been objected to and I hope no one will object to local authorities helping people to be clean whether in linen or in anything else. Where these facilities can best be provided by local authorities, then the local authorities will do it, but it is not intended that the local authorities will start up great competitive laundries or restaurants of that kind. They can supply restaurants under the Civic Restaurants Act. This is a question relating to hostels for old people and seeing


whether meals and laundry can be supplied to hostels, as well as other amenities.
Questions have been asked about labour and materials for new houses. It is not our intention to divert labour from new houses for this purpose, but it is known that about 45 to 50 per cent. of the building trade devotes itself to jobbing work. There is no reason why the small type of houses should not get their share of that jobbing work, and there are many villages where a great deal of labour which does not go into the building of new houses could be available for this purpose. I would like hon. Members to remember that all houses are not in towns and that many fine and substantial cottages in the better villages could be given greater amenities by some additions, without disturbing the tenant at all. There may be no change in the tenant and the work could be done while he is in the house. Then there was a question about development charge. Development charges often raise difficult legal points, but it is not likely that development charge would be chargeable in many cases under this Bill. If development charge does come in, it qualifies for grant as part of the expenditure on the job. The grant goes towards development charge as part of the whole expenditure.
I want to deal with the question of the 6 per cent. The question was raised as to why a distinction was made between Scotland and England. I agree that as between the landlord in England and the landlord in Scotland, this cannot be considered fair to the landlord in Scotland. But this is not a problem that has arisen just now. We did not establish the Scottish rating system. It was there before Labour was in office, when there were several Housing Bills. They dealt with the matter before Labour came into power, and they had the same rate of increase for England as Scotland.
In the Housing (Rural Workers) Act, 1926, it only amounted to 3 per cent. in England and Scotland and only on one-third of the cost. In 1935 the rate was increased to 4 per cent. We are giving 6 per cent. on half the cost. We have to keep in mind the tenant because if 6 per cent. on £300 is to be charged, that is £18 extra on the rent. What the tenant can afford to pay must be taken

into account as well as what the landlord can afford, and there must be a balance between the two. It may be that neither can afford to pay the cost of this work at the present time, but nevertheless we hope that costs will not always remain as high as they are and that they may come down. If the rate were raised to 8 per cent. it would mean that the £18 would be raised to £24 extra on the rent.

Mr. Willis: Plus rates?

Mr. Woodburn: Yes, it would be plus rates. I suggest that this is a fair compromise, but if the question of English and Scottish rates is to be considered it must be considered in a different atmosphere from this Bill. There are enough anomalies already and the solution will have to come forward in a more comprehensive way. Incidentally, the party opposite was in power for a great many years and they never tackled the problem. If Members opposite have any solution to offer that is acceptable to all concerned, I am willing to have a look at it. This is again a question of imposing some settlement on one section with which the other section does not agree.
I have met landlords from Glasgow, and they have put before me the problem of maintaining houses at present rates. They have pointed out that about 30,000 houses are likely to become dilapidated and fall into the hands of Glasgow Corporation, when they will become a liability instead of an asset. I have no reason to doubt that that is what they foresee. I suggested to them that they should go to Glasgow Corporation and that the two sides should get the facts. I told them when they agreed upon the facts to come to me with them, and that then I should be prepared to see what would be the solution. I have also consulted Glasgow Corporation, but according to the Corporation, when they have met the landlords on previous occasions and there has been any question of the Corporation taking over any properties, the prices have miraculously gone up.
If the landlords want to come to some arrangement with Glasgow Corporation to solve their problems, they must approach the matter in a reasonable way. I shall certainly try on my part to use my influence to get the Corporation to approach the matter in a reasonable way.


This is like the tied cottage problem, with the two sides not agreeing while the property is falling into decay. If these people get together the landlords must play their part and make a contribution towards a solution. There is no point in going to the Glasgow Corporation—I may be doing them an injustice—and demanding a price equivalent to a new house or capitalisation of the rent they have been receiving for 80 years.

Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison: They have been offering them free to the corporation.

Mr. Woodburn: After they have been drawing the rent for 80 years and are still drawing it. We want them to consider this problem reasonably. Under this Bill the corporation will have an opportunity to deal with a great deal of this property, and if they are prepared to take it over and if it can be modernised the landlord must get rid of his liability on reasonable terms. The terms must be reasonable and the corporation must accept them as being reasonable. The corporation will then find an economy. They will be able to maintain people in good houses, for whom they would otherwise have had to provide new houses.

Lieut.-Commander Clark Hutchison: Does not the right hon. Gentleman remember that a Committee was appointed in 1945 on the question of rating and presented a unanimous report?

Mr. Woodburn: With all respect to that Committee, the Report did not receive a unanimous acceptance. A great many people have to be consulted before what is in a report can be given legislative effect.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: It was an all-party Committee.

Mr. Woodburn: The hon. and gallant Member means that it was a Committee comprising individuals from all parties. All individuals in all parties are not reasonable, but some individuals in all parties may be. Members of the Committee may be very reasonable when sitting round the table, but that does not mean that their report is acceptable when it is made, because all the prejudices of the past of landlords and local authorities then come out.
The progress of the work started by this Bill will take one or two forms. First

of all, it is clear that the first step will be the sub-division of existing houses to form new houses. It will not be possible in the immediate future to join up houses and thus reduce the number of houses to form better ones. That will be the second stage. The third stage may be the conversion of non-residential buildings into residential buildings. But the progress will be gradual and will provide an opportunity for ingenuity on the part of people all over the country in ways which perhaps we do not see at the moment. It is wonderful how solutions are found to problems in our little towns and villages. They often find ways we do not see, and it is useful to give them this power to help themselves. I am a great believer in the Government giving help for people to help themselves.
There are a great many other parts of the Bill which it is impossible to discuss tonight, but during the Committee stage I am quite sure that many of the points raised tonight will be threshed out in greater detail, and it will not be because of lack of ingenuity on the part of hon. Members if we do not find solutions to the problems. The Bill then will not be less good than it is now, and if experience is any guide it may be better.

Mr. Rankin: Will the Minister say a word on the point I raised with regard to his powers under Defence Regulation 51?

Mr. Woodburn: Powers under this Defence Regulation still exist for the purpose for which it was made, but it is a different purpose from the purpose of this Bill. Powers under the Defence Regulations were always meant to be temporary powers for war purposes. The powers under this Bill are intended to be permanent, and to become part of the law of the land.

Mr. Rankin: Does the Bill now override the powers under Defence Regulation 51?

Mr. Woodburn: I have explained to the hon. Gentleman that the powers under the Defence Regulation will still exist when this Bill is passed. The powers in the Bill do not override the Defence Regulation, which will continue to be used for the purpose for which it was intended.

11.3 p.m.

Colonel.J. R. H. Hutchison: I want to make a few comments on this Bill because this is, as far as my constituency is concerned, an important occasion. The truest words spoken this evening have been those used in the last few minutes by the right hon. Gentleman when he answered some of the political prejudice poured out notably by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross), the hon. Gentleman the Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Willis) and to a lesser degree the hon. Gentleman the Member for Tradeston (Mr. Rankin). It would help if this jobbing-back into the past and mutual recriminations were stopped, but I must make the comment that the right hon. Gentleman, in his remarks on this subject—while he was calling for a truce so to speak on political prejudice—could not forbear from joining in himself, so deeply has this prejudice entered even into him.
The right hon. Gentleman called attention to comparisons between the First World War and the Second World War. What must be learned is that the circumstances were completely different. There had been no, or virtually no bombing, and there had been houses empty at the beginning of the First World War waiting for occupants. At the beginning of the Second World War there was a waiting list for houses. At the beginning of the First World War there was nothing like the demand for houses that there was at the beginning of the Second World War. No political parties staked their reputation on housing, and all the circumstances occurring after the Second World War—

Mr. Ross: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman read again the Report of the Royal Commission on Housing for Scotland for the year 1917? He will find what he is saying is absolutely false.

Colonel Hutchison: On the contrary; if that is the hon. Gentleman's point, in 1914 there were 17,000 empty houses in Glasgow.

Mr. Ross: The Royal Commission stated that 103,000 houses were required to deal with overcrowding alone, and another 100,000 to deal with condemned property of the one-roomed type.

Colonel Hutchison: I am talking of the city of Glasgow, to which the hon. Gentleman, with great temerity, as he does not represent a Glasgow constituency, referred. He went on to extremely thin ice in doing so and in holding up to obloquy the Government between the wars. The hon. Member for Tradeston said that in four years the Government had succeeded in building 8,000 houses in Glasgow. In 1929, in one year, private enterprise and the local authorities combined produced 6,300. I remember standing for the Glasgow Corporation in 1935, and my opponent promised that if the Socialist majority on the town council was continued in office, they would build 10,000 houses a year. They never did. From the day they got control of the Glasgow Corporation, and gradually cut off all private enterprise and went in for direct labour, the number of houses went down and down.
Today's shortage and the disgraceful housing conditions in Glasgow—because I do not join issue with hon. Gentlemen who have spoken on this matter—owe their origin to the blind dogma of the Socialists who controlled the City Corporation in the period immediately before the war. Those are facts, and if the hon. Gentleman studied them a little more closely, and came to Glasgow more often to see what happened, he would know them. But his political prejudice is such that he cannot listen to this subject in an objective way. I refer him to the Secretary of State.
The right hon. Gentleman has said that this 6 per cent. was carefully thought out and considered. I must accept what he says, but it looks to me as if this Bill were a classic example of what we complain of so much, of Scottish Bills being tacked on to English Bills like a dinghy to a yacht, and being dragged through stormy seas in which such a craft is quite unsuitable.

Mr. Woodburn: Perhaps the how and gallant Gentleman was not here at the beginning, when I pointed out that this Bill originated in Scottish conditions. When I have said that, I think he ought to accept it, and not repeat this slur on Scotland.

Colonel Hutchison: I said I accepted it, but that it had the appearance of someone in England having thought of


this 6 per cent. and it being consequently incorporated in a Scottish Bill. If this 6 per cent. is fair in England it cannot be fair in Scotland, with the different rating conditions. It may be that the cure is not an alteration of the percentage. It may be—and here I agree with the right hon. Gentleman—that the whole question which bedevils Scottish housing is the rating system, and the sooner that matter is tackled and put right the better.
Hon. Members on the other side were afraid that £90 million was to be spent on improving the property of private individuals. I am satisfied that, as the Bill stands, no money will be spent in that way. Hon. Friends of mine have shown that the effect in rural districts is likely to be negligible, because the system of tied houses is such that this Bill cannot have any effect. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Pollok has shown conclusively that as regards urban housing it will be of less than no effect. One may say that the landlord classes should rise to a height of altruism and philanthropy which should prompt them to accept a grant on which they are going to lose money, so as to be able to do something of this kind. But I have been unlucky, because whenever I made the suggestion to hon. Members opposite that they should accept some houses free, and I have offered them a chance to do it themselves, they did not accept. I was glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman say that pourparlers were going on with property-owners in Glasgow in an effort to reach some conclusion in what is really a desperate state of affairs, as the hon. Gentleman has himself admitted.
I want to make only one more observation, and it is an observation along a line which has not yet been touched upon. The crux and purpose of the Bill is to provide more accommodation. I will support any measure which will provide suitable accommodation in the quickest possible way. It must be realised that when you start to recondition or to repair houses, you must take away some labour and some materials from new house building. The question is whether you are going to get better results with one than with the other, or whether you are going to get the best results by combining the two operations. It seems to me that you have a different problem in different

places. Where you are reconditioning houses, in the main you use more labour and less material. Where you are building new houses, you use more material and less labour. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the situation differs in different parts of Scotland. He has, for example, the problem of moving miners from Lanarkshire to Fife, where new houses will be required, and, perhaps, the situation in Glasgow, which has been outlined so vividly by a number of hon. Members, where reconditioning may well produce results more quickly.
But it is a curious commentary that in the Economic Survey for 1949, it is stated that the aim was to reduce the labour force for house building over the whole country by 164,000 individuals. In fact, they did not achieve that figure, and many of the manpower targets as shown in the Economic Surveys were not attained. I wonder if the right hon. Gentleman has realised that it is intended to reduce the building labour force of the country. It may be that the Government will be more successful in achieving a reduction this year than it was last year. How is that going to affect his plan? I suggest that this Bill may do very little, unless a careful census and plan is made of where reconditioning can more fruitfully be applied, and where the best results will be obtained through the building of new houses.
The Bill is a "curate's egg" Bill. Parts of it are good, as the hon. Member for Rutherglen (Mr. McAllister) suggested. I, for my part, and I believe that we on this side of the House generally, welcome the intentions, but in many of the Clauses of the Bill the method has gone sadly astray. It is that method which we on this side of the House will have to try to improve, and to put right, during the Committee stage.

11.20 p.m.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: I believe that in the concluding part of his speech, the hon. and gallant Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel Hutchison) has touched upon the weakness of this Bill; but I believe that on the whole the Bill should be given a fair trial and a proper welcome, in so far as it makes a contribution to the solution of the housing shortage of Scotland. I believe it has now become universally accepted that


the housing problem of Scotland is by far the greatest social problem of all. I do not think that the Secretary of State has answered the question about the labour force. I have raised this question before, and I should like to ask if labour is to be diverted from the building of houses to this process of patching up? Here I speak with some 20 years' experience on a small local authority facing the housing problem; and, over that period, I am glad to say, we succeeded in solving the problem in so far as we were able to rebuild 83 per cent. of the houses in that area. If World War Two had not occurred, we should have been able to solve the problem in that Scottish town.
Does the Secretary of State realise the supreme urgency of giving greater attention to mobilising the labour force, both for the houses required in the great cities, and for those needed in the countryside? Like all hon. Members who represent Scottish constituencies, I get regular letters from constituents asking me to do something to get the houses so badly needed. These letters always seem to come in a shoal after some county council or town council has made its allocation of houses. I have collected a large batch of documents from constituents; and every letter represents a personal tragedy. They bear upon this Bill, and I should like to know how it is going to help solve the problem of these people It is only the building of houses on a very large scale that will solve it. The labour force which we have today is utterly inadequate for the gigantic task in front of it.
I have a letter from an old lady living in a village in Ayrshire, and she says:
We are living in one apartment, not fit for a pig, and I should like you to raise the subject when you speak in Parliament. We are twenty years without accommodation. We have two sons, twelve years in the Services, and is it right that they should come home in April to, the likes of the conditions we live in?
Here are two men coming home after giving the best part of their lives to their country to a house without water or any sanitary accommodation. What is to happen to that family under this Bill? One may patch up the houses, but in this case, where are we going to put the eight people? They are not miners, or agricultural workers, so that there is no

special provision for them, and there is absolutely no hope for them under this Bill at all. I have another case from a country village. This is a constituent who says there are eight in the family, with a girl who is a nurse, two boys, a girl of twelve and one of three-and-a-half. This constituent says it is a sin to have them all in one room:
We have to go to the farm for our water, and we have no sanitation. We have been in the house for 17 years, and my husband is a painter with Ayr Corporation.
How are we going to solve the problem of these people under the Bill? You cannot patch up their houses because you must find some other accommodation for them.
I have a third case—that of people living in a tied house owned by the National Coal Board. From the village of Muirkirk, I received a pathetic letter from a miner, who said:
There are three of us working, lying on the floor and there are people talking about us not getting a house. There are 10 of us in a single dwelling. There is no lavatory and no wash-house: in fact there is nothing here. I had the 'cruelty' man here to the children, because it was impossible to send them clean to school.
These are human problems—not the problem of the grim town slum, but of the country slum, the small collection of insanitary houses in the countryside. It is just as serious a problem in its own way as the gigantic problem of the Gorbals. I want to know how this Bill meets that problem. I cannot see how patching up houses here and there will help us in the big, gigantic drive which we all think is necessary in Scotland at the present time.
I am seriously perturbed about the whole question of building labour. I can go round Ayrshire and see scheme after scheme slowing down and breaking down because we have not mobilised our building labour force. I do not see that this problem is being tackled as seriously as it should be. We have heard in this Debate about the 21,000 houses per year. There is an estimated shortage in, Scotland of between 400,000 and 450,000 or even 500,000 houses, so we are faced with the fact that at the rate of progress last year it will take another quarter of a century before we shall see Scotland decently housed.
I want to see this problem tackled as a military operation because during the war, munition works and aerodromes were built in record time. I want to see the same drive, the same imagination and the same intensive purpose on the housing front as we showed in making the aerodromes and erecting the munition factories during the war.

Commander Galbraith: That was under the right hon. Member for Woodford (Mr. Churchill).

Mr. Hughes: I do not think that the right hon. Member for Woodford is particularly interested in housing. I have seen him in the big spectacular debates on battleships and bombers, but he never seems to show the slightest interest in housing. I am very doubtful if the right hon. Member has ever been in a municipal house in his life.
The Secretary of State for Scotland talked about a sort of reserve labour force at present engaged on repair work, but if it is to be transferred from this repair work to other repair work, it will not help us very much. The report of the Department of Health for Scotland for last year states that the shortage of joiners, plasterers and painters accounted for 640 out of the 957 labour vacancies on housing schemes at the end of the year. We start 1949 with a shortage of 640 joiners, plasterers and painters—all key workers. I can see, when this Bill comes on to the Statute Book, that in the small towns and the agricultural districts, where there is more of a property-owning complex, the Secretary of State will have to employ more officials to prevent the local builder taking his workers from housing schemes.
The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Pollok (Commander Galbraith) lives at Mauchline and I live at Cumnock. We are at present faced with the fact that the biggest plasterer between Mauchline and Dumfries will not undertake to offer himself for any new housing schemes. That is the position today. Now this legislation is complicating what is necessary for the housing drive and I urge the Secretary of State to look very carefully at this power which is being given to the local authorities.
I want now to make some constructive suggestions. First, I want to stop the recruiting of workers from the building

industry into the Forces. I believe that is absolutely essential. If hon. Gentlemen will follow this to its true logical conclusion they will support me in my claim that the plasterers, joiners, electricians and all the other skilled workers needed for the housing drive should be as exempt from military service as are agricultural workers and miners. In the House the other day I raised the question of the village blacksmith being exempt from military service, and after a little struggle I succeeded in getting him exempt on the ground that his work was necessary to agriculture. I am sure that the Ministry of Labour recognised the justice of that claim. Surely if the village blacksmith is to be exempt, it is logical to argue for the exemption of the joiners, plasterers, plumbers and other people who are essential if this work is to go on.
I believe that all people who have experience of the building trade should be brought out of the Forces and that the Minister of Works should be asked to release essential housing workers employed by his Department from the vast army of people engaged by it. It is a substantial army, because in reply to a question which I asked him on 4th April, the Minister of Works said that there were 27,500 building workers employed on works for the Service Departments, 4,100 were employed in building houses for the Services, and 362 of these were employed in Scotland. So I suggest that there is here a substantial margin for transferring building workers who have necessary technical experience.
Housing should have first priority. I ask the Secretary of State to make up his mind. There is a strong public opinion in Scotland determined that this housing problem must be tackled in a really urgent and realistic manner. After all, housing is a thing that remains. Large sums of money may be spent on bombers and a few years afterwards they are obsolete. We have heard different figures about the cost of houses during this Debate. At the present time the cost of one bomber is £300,000, the cost of about 200 houses.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Gentleman cannot go any further in that matter. He has made his point very cleverly.

Mr. Hughes: I want to follow the argument of the hon. and gallant Gentle-


man the Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel J. R. H. Hutchison) who said that the Economic Survey suggested a reduction of the number of building workers in industry. The Secretary of State for Scotland should put his foot down in the Cabinet and say to the powerful Ministers there, the Service Ministers, that we must have priority number one in houses if we are ever to solve it. The Prime Minister visited Glasgow last week and said that Communism was being created by bad conditions. We have built 21,000 permanent houses in Scotland last year. But we need about 450,000. At the present rate it will take 20 years to solve the problem. If we leave this housing problem for another 20 years, we are going the surest way to create Communism and discontent in this country. I wish that hon. Members for Scottish constituencies would take the same attitude toward housing as Parnell took about Home Rule for Ireland, and get at the Government until they force them to realise the absolute necessity for a change in their policy.
We have tremendous headway to make up in Scotland. We have some of the foulest slums in the world. I have seen the slums of Moscow and New York. Those of Glasgow are worse than any. We have houses and hovels that are a shame to all. I believe this Bill will be a step in the right direction, but I hope that the Secretary of. State for Scotland will impress on the Ministry of Labour the need for mobilising more workers in the building force. It is only by mobilising the labour force in the country that we shall get the houses needed throughout the length and breadth of Scotland.

11.37 p.m.

Mr. Niall Macpherson: I am sure that all hon. Members admire the pertinacity of the hon. Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) in pushing his subject all the time, and hope that it will have some effect on the Government. We are all concerned with the urgent need for providing more houses in Scotland. It may be that there is something wrong in the psychological attitude toward the provision of houses: they are not going up quickly enough, but this is not the occasion to enlarge upon that subject. I am not certain that

this Bill will alleviate or improve the psychological attitude toward housing in Scotland. We on this side welcome the release of all forces which can contribute to the housing drive in Scotland.
There are points in the Bill which, on the face of them, tend toward hastening a solution by allowing private individuals to come in, as a right, to participate in the building, rebuilding, conversion and improvement of houses. As the hon. and gallant Member for Central Glasgow (Colonel Hutchison) has pointed out, it is not certain that we are really getting to the roots of the matter. On 31st December, 1948—the date on which we had the last quarterly statement, three and a half years after the end of the war —some 35,000 permanent houses had been completed by local authorities. There were under construction at that time double that number. What was more, sites approved amounted to those for 273,000 houses.
This Bill puts into the hands of the local authorities all the licensing for improvements, and all the giving of grants for improvements, conversion and so forth. What likelihood is there that local authorities will give these facilities when they have this enormous amount of outstanding work of their own on their hands? The Under-Secretary—and I also should like to congratulate him on his first major appearance at the Box—really let the cat completely out of the bag because he admitted that in the initial stages they would have to be "rather selective." Those were his words. The hon. Member for Kelvin-grove (Mr. J. L. Williams) said that this was a long-term Bill and that we could not look for effects in the near future, but is that going to create the correct psychological atmosphere? People are going to be aware of their rights under the Bill. There will be long waiting lists at the local authorities of applicants ready to improve their houses, and that includes putting in water, sanitary arrangements, and all the rest.
On what basis can a local authority possibly decide priorities? The Secretary of State made a contribution to that when he said that the first step would be in subdivision of houses, secondly in joining up, and thirdly in conversion of non-residential buildings. He did not mention the


question of general improvement. I take it that that would be going on all the time but it shows the great difficulty we are in, in this matter. I am not at all certain that this is going to work out very well. I am afraid that far from being "rather selective," the Bill is going to be highly selective.
The local authority is given power to make grants towards the improvement or conversion of houses, where the cost is not less than £100 and not more than £600, but we should know whether the Secretary of State has discretion to vary either figure either way. Then we find that the amount of the grant is entirely at the discretion of the local authority—it may not exceed one-half. Is one-half to be the maximum to be granted in every case or is it within the discretion of the authority to give what it thinks right and proper and discriminate between applicants? We may point to the discretion given in the Bill. The State is to contribute three-quarters of the grant given to the local authorities but this may also be reviewed. It may be scaled down to two-thirds so that the local authority itself is in a difficulty and does not know what its ultimate liability is going to be.
That is a psychological error in the Bill. I deplore these discretions. If one is to give a grant of one-half, it may be one-half or a grant "not exceeding" one-half. It is wrong to give a discretion and to allow a suspicion of favouritism and discrimination to come in. It will create an entirely wrong psychological attitude. I deplore this error in the Bill and I hope we shall have an opportunity to correct it in the Committee stage. So much on the general matter.
There are two further observations I have to make. Clause 21 deals with the supplementary grants of £5 per annum in respect of houses built of stone. I want to refer to this because it greatly concerns my part of the world. I was disappointed by what the Under-Secretary said because he gave a narrow interpretation of that Clause. It gives a grant in order to preserve the character of surroundings and he narrowed the surroundings more or less to gaps in the street and historical monuments. I think the hon. Member for Banff (Mr. Duthie) referred to the necessity of using local material and having the materials required for the climate. Stone is the

traditional building material in Scotland, although we have a few bricks in one corner of the country. I should have thought that the correct policy was to encourage the use of stone. What is the position regarding the committee set up to look into the question of the use of stone in Scotland? We seem to have waited a long time for its report. Was the report before the right hon. Gentleman when he reached the decision to put in a grant of £5 and limit it to this very narrow extent?
Hon. Members have referred to the tied house. I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Banff in this connection. He says that the North-East of Scotland is particularly affected, but I can tell him that other parts of the country are affected as well. Previous Bills have sought to benefit workers and agricultural workers, but in Clause 1 of this Bill we wash out the workers and in Clause 2 the agricultural workers. The Bill is supposed to confer advantages on everyone except the agricultural worker. It is a remarkable thing that within the last week we have had a threat of a strike of miners because someone who was not a miner was put into a miner's tied house, whereas here the Government are on strike, so to speak, by encouraging people who are not agricultural workers to be put into agricultural tied houses.
The right hon. Gentleman has said "let the two sides get together," but he knows the wide difference between the representative body of the farmers and the so-called representative body of the farm workers. Surely it is up to him to give a lead in the matter. It may be that along the lines of contract of service lies the solution; but somehow a solution must be reached. Suppose that what the Minister of Health has said takes place. He obviously wants houses to be untied so that the farmer and the agricultural worker may get the advantage of the grant. What happens in the event of the occupant of a cottage deciding to leave his occupation as an agricultural worker? If that happens, a certificate can be applied for to the Department of Agriculture, and if he does not leave, the matter goes to the sheriff. The trouble is the delay that ensues. On the one hand, the farmer must have someone to carry on the work and to live close by; and on the other hand, he does not know whether


he will obtain possession of the cottage or have to build another. It should be possible to reduce that delay and even to abolish it altogether, which would be a step in the right direction.
One thing is quite certain, and that is that the solution to the tied cottage problem should not be attempted in a Bill of this kind. That is wholly wrong. Apart from that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Central Aberdeen (Mr. Spence) has pointed out, the Government have in fact departed from their pledge to do something in the place of the Rural Workers' Housing Act of 1926. The right hon. Gentleman said that in that Act there was a grant of only one-third of the expenditure. This Bill substitutes, if it can be called substitution at all, a half on condition that the cottages are un-tied.
That is a wholly improper method of dealing with the matter, the more so because the effect of this action is psychologically wrong. It is going to cause friction between the farmer and his employee who will be demanding the improvements, whereas the farmer quite naturally will tend to hold off for a more reasonable solution. This to my mind is certainly not the way to increase the production of food for the people; it seems an unworthy method of dealing with it, and I am sorry the right hon. Gentleman should have followed the Minister of Health, at any rate in this matter. I am sure the Secretary of State will not claim that he initiated this. In this part at any rate he has followed the Minister of Health and not for the better. In conclusion I congratulate him on the very fair way he summed up tonight, and I hope that his followers will "read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest" what he has said.

Mr. Woodburn: With permission of the House, I will answer the hon. Gentleman's question about the use of stone in building. The difference in the cost of building in stone as distinct from brick is much less than would be given under this Bill. I am sorry that in his closing remarks he referred to this silly business of Scotland following England. I explained that I had met the representatives of the farm workers and they are adamant against any money being given on tied cottages in Scotland. He should accept that statement and not repeat the other.

HOUSING (SCOTLAND) [MONEY]

Considered in Committee under Standing Order No. 84.—[King's Recommendation signified.]

[Mr. BOWLES in the Chair]

Resolved:

"That for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to amend the Housing (Scotland) Acts, 1925 to 1946, and to promote the improvement of housing accommodation in Scotland by authorising the making of contributions out of the Exchequer and of grants by local authorities (hereinafter referred to as "the Act") it is expedient to authorise—

A. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State in—

(1) making to a local authority or to a corporation established by an order under section two of the New Towns Act, 1946 (hereinafter referred to as a 'development corporation'), towards the annual loss determined by the Secretary of State to be likely to be incurred by them as a result of giving effect to proposals approved by him for the provision of dwellings by means of the conversion of houses or other buildings or the improvement of dwellings, an annual contribution for twenty years of an amount equal to three-quarters of that loss, or, in the case of a local authority for an area or a development corporation for a new town in the Highlands and Islands, as defined in the Housing (Agricultural Population) (Scotland) Act, 1938, seven-eighths of that loss:
(2) making to a local authority, towards the expense incurred by them in making to a person other than a local authority a grant in respect of expenses incurred by him for the purposes of the execution of works for the provision of dwellings by means of the conversion of houses or other buildings or the improvement of dwellings, an annual contribution for twenty years of an amount equal to three-quarters, or, in the case of a local authority for any area in the aforesaid Highlands and Islands, seven-eighths of the annual loan charges referable to the amount of the grant;
(3) making to a local authority, in respect of arrangements made by them with a housing association or development corporation for the provision of dwellings by means of the conversion of houses or other buildings or the improvement of dwellings, an annual contribution for twenty years of an amount equal to three-quarters, or in the case of a local authority for any area in the aforesaid Highlands and Islands, seven-eighths, of the annual loss determined by the local authority, with the approval of the Secretary of State to be likely to be incurred by the association or corporation in carrying out the arrangements;


(4) making to a local authority or the Scottish Special Housing Association, in respect of a house or flat the cost of providing which has been or will be substantially enhanced by expenses attributable to measures taken to preserve the character of the surroundings, an annual contribution, in addition to any contribution payable under the Housing (Scotland) Act, 1944, or the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act, 1946, for a period of sixty years of such amount as the Secretary of State may determine not exceeding, in the case of a local authority, five pounds, or in the case of the said Association, seven pounds ten shillings;

B. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State in making—

(1) to a local authority or development corporation, in respect of a new building provided, or a building converted, by them for use as a hostel (as defined by the Act); or
(2) to a local authority in respect of a new building provided, or a building converted, by a housing association or development corporation for such use being a building provided or converted under arrangements made by the local authority under section twenty-six of the Housing (Scotland) Act, 1935;

an annual contribution for such number of years, not exceeding sixty, and of such amount, not exceeding the sum produced by multiplying seven pounds by the number of bedrooms contained in the building, as the Secretary of State may determine;

C. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State in making a grant to a local authority or to the Scottish Special Housing Association in respect of—

(1) the construction of a house or flat by an experimental method, the use for the purposes of experiment of any materials in the construction of a house or flat or the installation in a house or flat, in the course of the construction thereof, of equipment or fittings for those purposes; or
(2) the incorporation or installation in a house or flat, otherwise than in the course of the construction thereof, of materials, equipment or fittings for those purposes;

D. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State attributable to any provisions of the Act empowering him to make contributions in respect of buildings provided or converted for use as hostels (as defined by the Act) which become vested in local authorities;

E. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenses incurred by the Secretary of State in reimbursing to a local authority not more than one half of any loss sustained by them under a guarantee given by them for the repayment of advances made to its members by a society incorporated under the Building Societies Acts, 1874 to 1939, or the Industrial and Provident Societies Acts, 1893 to 1928, for the building or acquisition of houses or flats, being a guarantee as to which

the Secretary of State is satisfied that the liability of the local authority thereunder cannot be greater than two-thirds of the principal of, and interest on, the amount by which the sum to be advanced by the society exceeds the sum which would normally be advanced by it without the guarantee;

F. the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of—

(1) any increase in the sums payable under section thirty-nine of the Housing (Scotland) Act, 1930, or Part II of the Local Government Act, 1948, out of moneys so provided which is attributable to the passing of this Act; and
(2) any increase in the sums payable under section twenty-six of the Housing (Scotland) Act, 1935, or under the Housing (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Act, 1946, out of moneys so provided which is attributable to the removal from the Housing (Scotland) Acts, 1925 to 1946, of references to the working classes; and

G. the payment into the Exchequer of all sums received by the Secretary of State under the Act."—[Mr. Woodburn.]

Resolution to be reported tomorrow.

AGRICULTURAL WAGES (SCOTLAND) BILL [Lords].

Considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read the Third time, and passed without Amendment.

HOUSING, STREATHAM

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. Hannan.]

11.56 p.m.

Sir David Robertson: We have heard a great deal tonight about housing, or the lack of it, in Scotland. I wish to talk about housing in my constituency Streatham was heavily bombed during the war, and in the life of this Parliament I have been deluged with letters from my constituents who are in desperate need of homes. These letters make pitiful reading and represnt a sum total of human misery which is heart-breaking. In the first year or so I was able to explain the massive task which faced the Government and the Wandsworth Borough Council, both of whom I was anxious to assist. I deprecated premature criticism in this House, I endeavoured to become acquainted with the difficulties and I brought the plight of my constituents to the notice of Ministers of Health and Works, to the borough councillors, and


officials, so that they would realise the urgency of the problem. Like all other hon. Members I earnestly hoped that the housing drive would succeed, and I genuinely regret that my hopes have not been realised.
The state of housing in Streatham is shameful. The Ministry of Health and the Borough Council have failed lamentably. The war has been over four years. The Government have been in office for almost four years, and the number of new permanent dwellings erected and completed by the council is only 41–41 new dwellings, in one of London's towns where there is a population of 75,000 people, and which was heavily bombed. The number of rebuilt demolished council dwellings which have been completed is 24. These are pitiful figures. A number of requisitioned houses have been divided into flats, and although the actual living accommodation has not been increased it is fair to say that a large number of people have been accommodated as a result of these conversions. At the present time there are 8,500 families, comprising over 27,000 people, on the borough housing lists awaiting rehousing, and there are many more on the lists of the L.C.C. These figures reveal abject failure. It is not a housing drive, it is a crawl.
Here are four examples of unwarrantable delays, and I believe these are typical of hundreds of cases throughout London and the country. First a small house of six rooms, 10, Blairderry Road, requisitioned in 1944 and occupied, vacated in March 1948, has remained unoccupied ever since. It is now being divided into two flats. I inspected it on Friday. I am amazed that such a small dwelling should be deemed worthy of conversion. It should have been offered to one of the large families on the housing list for immediate occupation. But here it remains, idle and empty, for 13 months, while the rent of £120 a year runs on and the taxpayer has to pay. One of the saddest things of all in relation to this particular house is that it did accommodate seven people before they started to convert it into two tiny flats, and now it will accommodate only six people, because that is all the accommodation which is provided. Actually, a bedroom has been lost in the conversion.
The second instance is one which I raised in this House on 10th March and again on the 24th March. It is a large self-contained flat, 29, Mount Nod Road. It was under requisition, and became vacant at the end of October, 1948. Any of the suffering families on the housing list would gladly have taken it. Two families wrote to me, which is how I got to know about this case. They wanted to occupy the flat as it was, but the council took the view that some decorative repairs were required—painting or wallpapering a room or two.
Here is one of the tragedies, I think perhaps the kernel, of the situation. It is that a council cannot spend more than £50 on a requisitioned dwelling without the consent of the Ministry of Health. The great Borough of Wandsworth, with a population of more than a quarter of a million and an annual income and expenditure running into millions, has to go cap in hand to the Ministry of Health if it wants to spend more than £50 on such work. These decorative repairs came to £64. There was four months of delay in corresponding and negotiations between the council and the Ministry of Health before sanction was given for this expenditure. And there are 27,000 people awaiting homes in this borough. Four months elapsed before paint was put on a wall or a wall was papered. Yet the house was ready for immediate occupation when it became vacant at the end of October. I saw this flat on Friday afternoon. It is available for accommodation, but is still unoccupied—more than five months delay while so many people are living in misery.
The third instance is that of a large double-fronted house at 41, Tierney Road and was requisitioned in May, 1948. After continuous occupation for years, a family walked out when the council requisitioned the house. Instead of putting the house at the disposal of people in desperate need, the council decided to divide it into three flats. There was eight months of negotiation and correspondence between the council and the Ministry before a scheme of conversion was approved. The work of converting the house is still going on. I saw this place also on Friday afternoon. It will be several months before the house is occupied. The rent is going on all the time,


and it cannot be less than £200 or £250 a year. So this house will be out of occupation for 12 months or more after being occupied continuously for 50 years; and out of that 12 months, eight months were occupied with these ridiculous negotiations between the council and the Ministry. During that time homeless people were passing the house and were writing to me about it.
The fourth and last example is 44, Gleneldon Road. These are all roads in Streatham only 15 minutes by road or rail from this House. Streatham was one of the most severely bombed areas of London. This small densely populated area received no fewer than 44 flying bombs in 1944 and more on its borders. Here is the report of the Wandsworth housing manager written a few days ago. He said that the house was previously let to a family which occupied the whole house from 15th January, 1945 to 28th June, 1948. On the premises becoming vacant, an immediate inspection was made and owing to the size of the accommodation it was recommended for conversion into two flats and passed to the borough architect on 6th July, 1948. May I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to give his attention to this? Details of the proposed conversions were submitted by the borough architect on 3rd January, 1949, to the Minister of Health. The house was vacated on 28th June. It was not until 3rd January that any scheme at all was put forward. The Ministry of Health considered that a more economical scheme of adaptation only should be adopted, excluding the greater part of the works of conversion. Specifications for the amended scheme are in course of preparation and will be submitted to the Ministry shortly. In short, a house vacated on 28th June, 1948, is still empty tonight, or rather this morning, 14th April. No work has commenced, and no plans have been approved.
These dreadful cases of delay have all occurred in the last year when labour and materials have been available. They are due to unwarrantable delay by the borough council and to the financial control of the Ministry of Health, conducted in a leisurely fashion, entirely out of keeping with the times in which we live. It has to be remembered that the rent is being paid all the time, and greater sums are being wasted in that way than

would be saved on checking and pruning repairs. Great waste is going on as a result of this ridiculous financial control. I am more concerned about the health and wellbeing of the people than in saving a few pounds per house after months of delay. Every public health regulation is being broken daily in my constituency through overcrowding with all the other troubles which flow from such conditions. If the situation is not remedied, the people will sweep those responsible from office, and that will be a well-deserved fate.

12.7 a.m.

Mr. Skeffington: I do not want to be as critical as the hon. Member for Streatham (Sir D. Robertson) has just been, but I should like to say that I am concerned about the delays in repair to requisitioned property in my own borough of Lewisham. I consider that that borough has done a good job in the post-war circumstances so far as housing is concerned. We had no claim to be considered as a competent housing authority; no land was purchased for re-building, before the end of the war as requested, and there was no real housing department: we had no architect. It was many years since the borough had taken a direct part in any house-building, though there were some appalling buildings, some more than 100 years old. But we have been able to re-house eight thousand families and that, I think, is not a bad record.
Nevertheless, one is continually having one's notice drawn to properties which have been requisitioned and not used, and this is all the more galling to people needing accommodation so badly, who see these houses daily. This gives rise to the wildest rumours. Recently, for example, it was stated that there were "hundreds" of such premises in the borough which were remaining empty for two years; but, on investigation, of course, this was found to be nothing like the truth of the position. But if there is only a very small number remaining empty for a few months, the position should be brought to the notice of the Minister and remedied at once.
There are, I think, two categories; there is the case where houses become vacant after they have been occupied for a period as a requisitioned property. This is the type of case quoted by the


hon. Member for Streatham. I have two such examples before me now. One became vacant on 22nd November, and another on 16th December, and when I complained to the local authority, I was told: "Well, these repairs are reckoned to cost more than £50, and therefore, we must get the permission of the Ministry." Furthermore, the Ministry insisted that the work should go out to competitive tender. Really we just cannot wait for the long-winded procedure. I know it is public money that is being used, but these local authorities are great public concerns, and surely they should be given a little more discretion. If there was thought to be some error, surely they could be subject to a surcharge. A surcharge could be levied if it was thought the local authority had really done something not in order. In any case, surely competitive tender is not necessary for these small amounts.
The second category is that where repairs have to be done when the premises are first requisitioned. I have one example requisitioned last July and still not available. I do beg the Minister, if he can, to give us some encouragement tonight by saying that the whole system of authorisations will be looked at and that these large local authorities will be given a little more discretion financially than has been given to them in the past. After all, the great boroughs of Wandsworth and Lewisham collect and disburse millions of pounds every year. Surely they could be trusted to do the job without these cumbrous checks.

12.10 p.m.

Mr. Linstead: I want to endorse very warmly the plea about housing conditions in the borough of Wandsworth, which the hon. Member for Streatham (Sir D. Robertson) has put to the House. It is no credit to the present Administration that four years after the war came to an end, we still have in this borough a housing list as long as the list at the end of the war. Something like 25,000 people are still requiring to be re-housed and I can endorse from experience in my part of the borough, the great annoyance and discouragement which is felt by the people there when they find empty houses not being converted and, if converted, still standing

empty for weeks and sometimes months, when people know that there are long lists of applicants waiting for homes.
The point I should like to mention to the Parliamentary Secretary in particular is the difficulty caused by the overlapping of activities as between the L.C.C. and the boroughs. That is particularly bad in Putney where there is open land and competition between the L.C.C. and the borough for the use of that land. There seems to be a lack of co-ordination and where schemes are started—sometimes by the county and sometimes by the borough—they seem to be too large for the resources available. They are started and abandoned, or started and slowed up and then, when they are completed by the County Council, people are brought in from other parts of London so that the case of the local inhabitants is by no means assisted. In fact, there is a great deal of friction because they find their own list in the borough as long as ever and because the overriding authority of the County Council is used to take what they regard as their own land and use it for people from outside their own borders. I think that question of co-ordination between the county and the borough is a problem which should really receive the attention of the Minister.

12.13 a.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health (Mr. Blenkinsop): I appreciate the concern of hon. Members in all parts of the House on the question of ensuring as speedily as possible the provision of accommodation for the very many people in their constituencies and elsewhere who are urgently needing housing accommodation. Tonight I will try first to deal specifically with the points raised by the hon. Member for Streatham (Sir D. Robertson) in connection with requisitioned property that requires repair and maintenance, where licensees have already been in occupation and where there has been a change of licensee, and he is very properly complaining of delays which have occurred. In the specific case which the hon. Member for Streatham has raised and which he raised in Questions in the House, I would not attempt to defend the delay which occurred. It is the case of a particular property which the hon. Member raised; it was quite extraordinary and I hope to suggest a way


in which to ensure that it will not occur again.
I should like to put this matter in its proper setting. In fact, local authorities hold under requisition some 90,000 properties and very many of those are held here in London. When maintenance and repair work must be carried out, a convenient time to do it is when there is a change of licensee. If the amount of work to be carried out is under the value of £50, no application to the Ministry of Health will need to be made, although the cost is to be met out of Exchequer funds. If the cost is to run out at anything more than £50, the procedure in the past—and it will continue to be so in the future—was that an application had to be made to the Ministry for approval. The reason for delay in the particular case that has been raised, is that an estimate was submitted to the Ministry without any competitive tender having been obtained. In this particular case the direct labour scheme was suggested and it has been the practice of the Ministry, in its proper desire, I should have thought, to safeguard Exchequer funds, to require a competitive tender to be put forward.
In the normal case this type of problem does not cause any difficulty. We find that on the average, roughly about 100 cases of this kind are submitted each week to the Ministry and they are dealt with within a fortnight. I do not think there can be any complaint about that. But I agree that where an authority, such as Wandsworth, has its own direct labour force and where the estimate is under £100, it is unreasonable that a competitive tender should be asked for, and we are arranging in such cases that in future we shall not require this competitive tender so long as the case is submitted to the Ministry for the ordinary reasonable checking of the estimate. After all, this is national money and I should have thought that hon. Members on the other side of the House would have been anxious to see that a proper check is made on expenditure of that kind.

Mr. Linstead: Would the Parliamentary Secretary explain what is the value of the competitive tender for work being done by a local authority under the direct labour scheme?

Mr. Blenkinsop: It is to see that the cost put forward in the direct labour tender by the local authority is comparable with a tender by a builder. It has, in practice, saved a considerable sum of money. Where the sum involved is small, we are not going to insist on it in future. In the case of new requisitions, longer delays occur because much larger sums of money and different principles are involved. We must insist that there is a proper check on schemes submitted for conversion of properties which in some cases, in our view, are unsatisfactory for conversion. Often we find proposals are put forward that would involve large sums of money without any proper guarantee that the dwellings will be of real value for housing purposes over a reasonable period of time. In that type of case it is inevitable that there will be some delays to ensure that the money spent for that purpose is properly spent. It is all too easy to waste very large sums of money indeed on conversions that do not really give us the kind of accommodation we want. I therefore urge hon. Gentlemen not to press us to do, without a proper check, this type of conversion, where I suggest it is essential we should have this proper check.
It is the case that where new conversions and new requisitioning do not require expenditure of more than £250 in repairs to make them fit for occupation, no application need be made to the Ministry. I should have thought that was a reasonable limit under which quite valuable minor conversions can be carried out. If we were to make wider provision for authorities to spend much larger sums without proper check and examination, I am sure that the hon. Member for Streatham would be the first to complain about extravagance and waste.

Sir D. Robertson: No one is more conscious of the need to protect the public purse than I am, but I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will read in the OFFICIAL REPORT what I said—the cases I gave about human misery. I have files of most agonising letters. Savings of sixpences and pence cannot be set against them.

Mr. Skeffington: Why cannot the hon. Gentleman deal with the question of surcharge of authorities? That is done by other Government Departments. Why


cannot the method be used in these cases?

Mr. Blenkinsop: I do not think that this is a suitable field for surcharge. Authorities should know where they stand. Where a small sum up to £250 is involved in the case of new requisitioning for repairs, required before occupation, no application need be made by authorities to the Ministry; but surely it is reasonable to insist that where larger sums are involved, proper application should be made and a proper check should be instituted to ensure that the best possible use is made of the sums involved.
I assure hon. Members that we are most anxious to assist in every way we can. I believe that the change I have mentioned, which has been notified to the Wandsworth Council, will help in securing a speedier handling of the problems of repair and maintenance as they arise. I insist that the Ministry, far from being dilatory, is dealing with the general run of problems at a reasonable and efficient rate.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-three Minutes past Twelve o'Clock.